


Ride-Along with Reece

by foreverHenry919



Category: Forever (TV 2014)
Genre: Co-workers, Crime Scenes, F/M, Gen, Multi, Murder, Other, Reveal, Romantic Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-05
Updated: 2020-05-24
Packaged: 2021-01-23 19:57:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 25
Words: 46,920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21325792
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foreverHenry919/pseuds/foreverHenry919
Summary: Each year, the department enforces a mandated ritual day in uniform, including plainclothes detectives. Reece takes advantage of the day to also announce her annual, week-long ride-along with one of her detectives.
Relationships: Abe Morgan & Henry Morgan, Henry Morgan & Lucas Wahl, Jo Martinez & Henry Morgan, Mike Hanson & Henry Morgan
Comments: 128
Kudos: 137
Collections: DarkBloodWolf13's Collection





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own "Forever" TV show 2014 or any of its characters.

This fic takes place in August 2015, approximately three months after May 2015 when the series was cancelled.

_____________________

Although Joanna Reece had served for a little more than a year as Lieutenant over the 11th's Homicide Unit, it was her first Uniform Day with them, having missed the previous year's ritual by less than a month, when she'd taken over from Lt. Marcia Roarke. She was thankful that she still fit into her uniform. All those hours of sweat equity racked up in a popular fitness facility had paid off. But the thought of spending the day in the constricting uniform prompted her to announce that her week-long ride-along would begin the next day.

"Who's the lucky stiff?" Det. Rick Morse playfully asked her, eliciting titters from the other precinct members standing around.

"You volunteering, Detective?" Reece asked, an eyebrow raised.

"Uh --- no, no. I had my day last year with Lt. Roarke," he replied, his smile washed away. The prospect of spending his work day with another hard-as-nails professional female superior was enough to push him into early retirement. _'These female cops,'_ the 25-year veteran grudgingly thought to himself. _'Give 'em a higher title and a corner office --- '_

"Looks like _I'm_ the lucky stiff, then," Reece threw back at him, eliciting titters once again from the others. "Doesn't matter that we're all trussed up today as if we could march in a cadet revue, we still do our jobs," she reminded them. "That's all for now, everyone," she said, releasing them back to their regular duties. Instead of retreating to her office, she walked over to join Jo and Mike at their desks.

"I'll be riding along with you two starting tomorrow," she told them in a lowered voice. "Oh, and, uh, I understand that Dr. Morgan still occasionally accompanies one or both of you to crime scenes." They both nodded, temporarily tongue-tied. "This should be interesting." She gave them a toothy grin and returned to her office.

The two detective partners stared at each other then slowly sat down in their chairs. Jo turned to stare at her desk phone, thinking that she should call Henry to warn him. Maybe advise him to take the day off. The entire week off. His strange behavior and some of the things he said might be taken the wrong way by the Lieutenant. And what if he did anything dumb or dangerous that she normally would cover up or omit from her reports, altogether? How would she be able to do that with Lieu witnessing his antics in real time?

A worried Mike plopped down into the chair next to her desk. "Better tell the Doc," he whispered. "Let him know no monkey business for the next few days if he knows what's good for him."

Jo closed her eyes and opened them again, side-eyeing him. "Monkey business?"

"You know what I mean," he countered. "No takin' evidence without a warrant. No jumpin' in front of cars or bullets. No accusing mayors or state senators of murder without any proof!"

Jo closed her eyes again, nodding at his every statement. "Got it," she replied. He rose from the chair and took a step back toward his own desk. "He was right each time, though." Mike stopped, holding his breath. "He nailed each perp because he knew things that we did not," she reminded him. She stood up and turned to face Mike's back. He slowly turned around to face her and released his breath before he replied.

"Yeah, but he always knows things that we don't," he replied, frustrated. "Look. I like the Doc as much as you do. Well --- maybe not as _much_ as you do," he smirked. "But still, he's an okay guy and I'm worried that Lieu won't understand his wacky investigation approach and ground him or report him."

"Um-hmm. And maybe get us in trouble, too?" she asked, choosing to let that "not as much as you do" part go. Mike shrugged slightly but said nothing. She nodded and told him that she was on her way to the morgue to have a talk with their enigmatic ME.

Mike cursed himself as he watched Jo walk out of the bullpen, thinking it might have been better if he had warned Henry instead.

vvvv

Jo entered the morgue to find Henry at the other end, weighing what looked like a ... brain ... or what was left of a victim's brain after a flesh-eating bacteria had destroyed most of it. She swallowed and snatched her eyes away from the sight of it. As she slowly drew closer to him, he calmly made some quick notes onto a clipboarded form and then handed the organ off to Lucas, who whisked it away to deposit it into a specimen jar. No matter how many dead bodies she'd seen, it was still unnerving to view their innerds. Henry and Lucas seemed to handle the victims' organs as if they were simply different cuts of meat in a butcher shop. Well, she told herself, it took a special kind of person with a certain kind of mindset to do what they did. And no matter how much she admired the both of them and appreciated all that they did to help point the NYPD toward the right perp, she was thankful to be one who did not possess that certain kind of mindset.

Henry put the cap back onto his inkpen and pushed it down into the top pocket of his white lab coat. He turned and greeted her with a broad smile. "Good morning, Detective. Might I add that you do justice to the uniform."

She'd almost forgotten that she was suited up for the day. "Thank you," she replied, touching the brim of her cap but unable to enthusiastically accept the compliment, having mixed feelings about this Uniform Day thing. Okay, she got it that it was to remind everyone on the force that their primary reason for being on the job was to protect and serve the public. That no position was more important than the other and that everyone's efforts should work toward the greater good. "Came to give you a heads up about tomorrow."

"About the Lieutenant choosing to ride along with Det. Hanson and you?"

"How did you --- ?"

"Just got off the phone with her a few minutes ago," Henry replied. "Apparently, she wanted to ward off me suffering a heart attack at her being with us if I went out on a call with you."

"Oh. She's quick," Jo said, surprised that her boss had beat her to the punch, thinking that Reece had wanted to evoke shock and awe from him tomorrow with her unannounced presence. "So you understand that you have to color within the lines if we do," she stated more than asked.

Henry appeared to take exception to that. His mouth and eyes popped open as he looked left and right, then back at her. "Detective, you make it sound as though I were some type of problem child who's going to misbehave and embarrass you." He put up a hand and jutted his chin out when she started to respond. "I can assure you that I will be on my best behavior tomorrow," he promised, giving her a slight bow.

"And the rest of the week," she prompted him as she followed him into his office.

"And the rest of the --- week???" he asked, whirling back around to face her.

vvvv

Abe's Antiques later on that evening ...

Abe could not contain his laughter. He'd tried more than once but every time he looked at his father's pinched face, the laughter would burst out of him again.

"Abraham, you do understand that spending an entire week with the all-knowing, all-seeing Lieutenant could spell disaster for me," Henry told him.

"Yeah, yeah. That's the problem," Abe sputtered between laughs. "I do understand."

"If you understand, then you shouldn't be laughing!" Henry exclaimed.

"Dad, Dad, it's just that ... " he paused to catch his breath and rein in his laughter. "You manage to get yourself into the dungeons of dung sometimes."

Henry shut his eyes and pressed his lips into a thin, annoyed line. "Jo suggested that I call out sick for the rest of the week."

"That would take care of everything," Abe said. He resumed eating the rest of his meatloaf dinner.

"It would," Henry quietly agreed, his head lowered. He then raised his eyes to meet Abe's, a gleam in them and raised his head, his lips perked up into a determined smile. "No. I shall not be the coward in the face of adversity."

"In the face of ... oh, for Heaven's --- " Abe stopped eating and lowered his forehead into his palm.

"I shall participate in this, ah, ride-along with the good Lieutenant." Seemingly satisfied with his bold decision, he resumed eating his dinner, as well.

"And what if something happens?" Abe grumbled at him.

"Nothing will," he confidently replied. "I gave my word to Jo that she could expect my best behavior and I won't let her down."

"Take the burner phone with you," Abe grumbled again. Henry frowned at him and he added, "Just in case. Please." Henry shook his head and took a sip from his wine glass.

vvvv

The next morning, things were, thankfully, quiet. No calls came into the precinct of a dead body anywhere. Six minutes before noon, Jo and Mike heaved a joint sigh of relief and prepared for lunch. Mike stayed at his desk and pulled out a steak sandwich brought from home while Jo opted for a Philly cheesesteak burger from the food truck parked in the southwest corner of the building near the bike racks. She had just exchanged her money for the burger when her cell phone rang. Groaning at the LT REECE on the Caller ID, she quickly answered it.

"Martinez."

(_"Got an anonymous tip on the whereabouts of Todd Davidson's suspected murderer."_)

"That's great!"

_("Meet us out front. We'll be going back to the crime scene."_)

"O-okay." They ended the call and Jo took a quick bite of her burger. She returned to the front of the building and walked over to her car. She chewed and swallowed but realized that the tasty burger was now garbage and she tossed it into the nearby garbage can. A quick swig of her diet root beer and it, too, was tossed. Maybe Abe could try again to fatten her up with one of his delicious dinner meals later on, she hoped. A few minutes later, Reece, Hanson, and Henry emerged from the building and they piled into her car.

While they drove back to the crime scene, Reece informed them that uni's were bringing their victim's widow and their prime suspect, Tyne Davidson, there. When Mike asked why she wasn't just brought in for more questioning, Reece looked at Henry seated next to her in the back seat and replied, "We need her to confess --- and Henry has a plan."

_________________________  
**Author's Notes**: A short beginning, I know, but this is a busy week for me and I didn't want to wait to start publishing this. Hope you enjoy it. And what plan does Henry have? My typing fingers with a mind of their own will unveil that in the next chapter.

**Notes**:  
Inspired by an episode of "Barney Miller" TV show entitled, "Uniform Day" (S05/E12). It aired over ABC TV network on 7 Feb 1980. Also, an episode of "Blue Bloods" TV show entitled, "Shoot the Messenger" (S05/E07), in which Det. Danny Reagan's boss, Lt. Carver, decides to ride along with him for an up close look at him and his daily routine. It aired on 7 Nov 2014, also over CBS.


	2. Ride-Along with Reece Ch 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Henry forgets to behave and gets more than he bargained for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do not own "Forever" TV show 2014-2015 or any of its characters.

"What plan?" Hanson asked, looking over his shoulder at Henry. 

Henry, working to mask his surprise, replied, "It's, ah, mostly a theory I discussed with the Lieutenant; that Mr. Davidson was actually killed by a much stronger and heftier person than their son, Stewart." Like Hanson, though, he thought that once Mrs. Davidson had been located, she would be brought in for further questioning. 

"Your plan to arrest Dwight Dziak's fiancee, Emily Sontag, for his murder in order to ferret out the true culprit worked brilliantly," Reece replied. "It's an old ploy but it should work in this case, too." 

"Mmm," Jo hummed. "So, we're arresting her son, Stewart?" 

"Not exactly," Henry replied. "We --- threaten to arrest him." 

"Frighten the truth out of her," Reece added. 

"I see," Hanson commented. "You think there's another player here like maybe a boyfriend." 

"Possibly, Detective," Henry told him. "Stewart and his mother appear to be very devoted to each other. We are hoping that she will reveal the true culprit, whoever that might be." 

"That's right," Reece agreed. "They were detained at JFK trying to flee the country." 

"But why go back to the crime scene?" Jo asked. 

"Added pressure," Reece replied. "Sometimes being in the same spot where a victim took their last breath helps loosen a witness' or murderer's tongue." 

"Let's hope it works," Hanson said. 

Soon after, they found themselves in the kitchen of the Davidson residence on Leroy Street in Greenwich Village with a defiant Tyne Davidson and her nervous son, Stewart, brought there by unis. 

"Why were we hauled in from the airport like criminals?" Tyne asked them. 

"Criminals. Funny you should say that," Jo dryly remarked, resting her gaze on Stewart. "Why were you two trying to bug out of the country?" 

Tyne's eyes narrowed at Jo. "Look, my husband's dead; we can't bring him back. But this vacation was planned months ago. Just because you don't know who killed Todd doesn't mean that we have to put our lives on hold." 

"Oh, but you're wrong," Henry countered, stepping closer to Stewart, his hands clasped behind his back. "We have a pretty good idea of who killed your husband." 

Nervousness gave over to worry on Stewart's face. He licked his lips and said, "Don't look at me. I, I didn't do it." His voice rose. "Mom! Tell 'em! I would never hurt Dad!" 

"Todd Davidson died from being the victim of a powerful grappling hold that critically reduced or prevented air and blood from passing through his neck," Henry said, keeping his gaze on Stewart. "His hyoid bone or larynx was crushed, preventing him from having uttered a sound. It would have taken less than a minute for him to die." 

Tyne glared at Henry while he and his colleagues all stared at her son. She moved closer to Stewart and stepped in front of him as if to shield him from their indirect accusations. 

"Who is the man?" Henry abruptly asked her, turning to face her. 

"What man?" 

"The man you've gone to such lengths to protect; the one you're still protecting. The gentle man. The man so unlike your husband," Henry replied. 

"I don't know what you're talking about." 

"I believe you do. He is different, isn't he? He has to be; otherwise, he'd be fighting for you out in the open." 

'You're the most --- the _second_ most obnoxious person I've ever met," Tyne ground out. 

"Second only to your husband?" Henry surmised. 

"I think the reason I dislike _you_ so intently is because there's something about you, though in a subtler way, that reminds me of Todd." 

"Mom, you don't have to say anything to them," Stewart told her. "I'm not a laywer yet but I know that much!" 

Ignoring her son, Tyne continued. "There's the same initial impact of a strong personality. The same steady, insistent preying to overcome obstacles that ... (scoffs) well, that I find attractive." Her eyes flicked quickly up and down him at the same time that Jo leveled a wary glare at her. "It's a good deal softer in you. And wiser and more humanitarian. But it's there." 

"I suppose I should be flattered," Henry wanly replied. "Flatter me instead with the name of the man you're protecting. Does his safety mean more to you than that of your own son's?" 

"Mom --- he's just bluffing and we both know that I didn't kill Dad. Don't say anything more," Stewart urged her. His short, black hair trembled along with his voice, his eyes more hazel than Henry's, flashed with anger at the crime solvers. 

Tyne turned her head slightly toward him and put up a hand to shush him. She looked from one to the other. "You're really prepared to pin this on my son," she stated. 

"He had motive, opportunity," Hanson dryly commented. "You got a better suspect for us, better give 'im up." 

Tyne lowered her eyes and then her head, her earlier defiance waning. "Alright, I'm not going to fight with you any longer. I was trying to keep both of them away from you." 

"Mom. Who are you talking about?" 

"I'm talking about ... ," Her voice trailed off as it softened, keeping her eyes locked with Henry's. She turned around to face her son. "How could you have known about the widening gap between your father and me over the last several years. You were away at military school and then college and weren't here to see how he'd found other women to fill that gap. I found myself doing the same with ... " Her voice trailed off again and she lowered her eyes. 

Stewart's face darkened. "Who, Mom? With who!?" he angrily demanded. Tyne didn't answer right away. Stewart grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her. "Did this guy, **yourrr** _**loverrrr**_, kill my father?!" he loudly and harshly demanded. Tyne began to cry but said nothing. Stewart shook her again, harder, shouting his demands, prompting Henry and Hanson to step in and pull them apart. Hanson kept Stewart at bay while Henry gently moved Tyne over toward his two female colleagues. 

"Easy, easy," Hanson bid Stewart, his arm raised to block any movements toward his mother. 

"Easy!? Some guy who was bangin' my mother killed my father!" Stewart glared over Hanson's broad shoulder as he yelled at her again. 

"It wasn't like that!" his mother blurted out. 

"Then, who is he, Mom? Tell 'em. Tell 'em the name of the man you cheated on Dad with and let kill him!" 

"Who is he, Mrs. Davidson?" Jo quietly asked her. 

Tyne looked up at her, blinking more tears back. "Seth. He ... he was there for me after Todd started with the other women. They were bold. Brazen," she said, shaking her head and grimacing. "Never tried to hide a thing from me. Todd laughed when I asked, begged him to stop, to go to counseling with me to save our marriage. Then, after Seth and I ... Eventually, I began to ask for a divorce and Todd still laughed at me." She paused again for a few breaths and looked lost in her painful memories. As she turned back around to face her son, the spot where her husband's body had been found loomed into her view. She momentarily shut her eyes tightly, then reopened them. "It had to be self defense. Seth had only wanted to talk to Todd to get him to agree to a divorce!" 

"If it was self defense, as you say, then your friend, Seth, has nothing to worry about. Now, what is his last name, Mrs. Davidson?" Jo asked again. "And how can we reach him?" 

vvvv 

It turned out that "Seth" was actually Seth Frieburg, a young assistant to Todd in his optometry practice. He was only a few years older than Stewart, but more than 15 years younger than Tyne. Stewart had met the news with both shock and disgust. He still loved his mother but couldn't understand what had caused the rift in his parents' marriage, leading them to seek comfort in outside affairs. He wasn't sure why, but it especially disgusted him to think of his mother being romanced by a much younger man. 

They had found Seth at the optometry office making a quick inventory of things in the supply room in the back. Reece continued to observe while she and the others approached him. They all frowned at the sight of the young man no larger than Stewart. Reece was the first to speak but kept her eyes trained on their new suspect. 

"You thinking what I'm thinking, Henry?" Reece whispered. 

Henry exhaled. "If it's that this young man doesn't fit the physical profile I had in mind, then, yes." 

"Which means we've got a little more work to do," she noted. 

Henry nodded, his lips pressed tightly together. "Of course. But he can probably shed some new light on things, depending upon what he has to say." 

Reece smiled. "I like the way you think, Henry. I'm told your methods are unorthodox but they seem to have worked for you all this time. You're right. Let's hear what the young man has to say." 

They drew closer to Seth and identified themselves. "Just finishing up this inventory. Not sure if the office will remain open now that ... now that Todd is gone." He laid down his pen and clipboard and faced them squarely. "How can I help you, Detectives? 

Jo asked the first question. "Were you and Mrs. Davidson having an affair?" 

Seth swallowed before replying. "Affair. That word makes it sound like we didn't really care for each other. We did love each other ... for a while." 

"What happened?" Hanson asked. "After you killed her husband, she had no more use for you?" 

"No!" Seth loudly protested. "I didn't kill him. She just ... " He sighed. "She, she did want to end things. Said we looked ridiculous together. Her being so much older than me." 

Henry stiffened at those words. Painful memories confronted him about his Abigail's increasing discomfort of being seen in public with him as she had visibly aged and he had not. He had to force himself to breathe again, hoping that his inner turmoil remained unnoticed by anyone, especially the Lieutenant. 

"Musta been hard," Hanson began, "I mean not just sneakin' around with a married woman but tryna go anywhere with her without being harrassed." 

"I don't know," Jo interjected in a sarcastic tone. "If men can have much younger lovers, why can't women?" 

If Hanson's last remarks had pained him again, bringing up those sad memories with his Abigail, Henry was unexpectedly encouraged at the voicing of Jo's opinion. It gave him hope for any future that he and the lovely detective might have. If only --- 

"Well, that's how you and I think," Seth remarked. "She said we had to end it, though. That she had 'indulged a weakness' and that I should find someone closer to my own age." He scoffed. "She said that I'd get over her." 

"Did you go see her husband to get him to agree to a divorce for her?" Jo asked. 

"Yeah, I went over there but I couldn't get up the nerve to ring the doorbell. So I left." He was clearly disappointed with himself. "But kill him? I wouldn't kill anyone for anything." 

They questioned him further to find out what time he'd shown up at the Davidson home. While he answered that it was around 7:45 that night, the sound of someone banging on and cursing at a vending machine drifted in from the hallway. 

"Excuse me, please," Seth requested. "They're gonna break the darn thing." He quickly moved past them and rushed into the hallway. He looked to his right and loudly ordered the person to stop making such a ruckus. They followed him into the hallway to make sure he wasn't trying to duck their questions and stopped in their tracks when a young man about Lucas' age appeared at the end of the short hallway. He was just as tall as Lucas but packing nearly 100 pounds more of heavy muscle. He walked up to the vending machine and gently nudged aside an upset young woman employed as a receptionist. 

She grinned up at him and said, "Superman's here to save the day!" She stepped aside and gleefully urged him, "Do your stuff!" 

They all watched in awe as the large young man reached one arm across the top of the vending machine and grasped the back of it. He tilted the heavy machine forward a full foot as if it weighed nothing and quickly released it. It fell back loudly as it rested upright once again, dislodging his co-worker's chocolate bar. She clapped and thanked him then retrieved the bar from the take-out port and walked back to the reception desk. 

"My younger brother, Sidney," Seth told them with a mixture of pride and embarrassment. "He's got Arnold's strength without the swag." He walked up to Sidney and patted him on the back, grinning. "He's as strong as an ox but ... a gentle giant." 

The crime solvers had quickly approached the two young men, noting the brother's muscular build and that he appeared to fit the profile of Todd Davidson's suspected killer as theorized by Henry. They identified themselves to him but before either of them could ask any questions, Sidney, visibly upset, demanded to know why they were there. 

"Are the police here to hurt you?" he asked Seth. Jo assured him that they just wanted to ask some questions but it was fast becoming clear to them that Sidney's intelligence level was challenged. 

"My brother sometimes gets, uh, confused and overly excited," Seth told them. "It's okay, Sid. They're just here to ask questions about Mr. Davidson. You remember him, don't you?" he asked him. Sidney nodded with his lower lip drooped and his worried eyes roaming over them. 

"Someone hurt him ... bad." 

"That's right," Seth said soothingly. "It's their job to find out who hurt him so bad that he died. We wanna help them, right?" 

Sidney abruptly stopped nodding and clamped his mouth shut. "He was a bad man. He wasn't nice to people. He made her cry." 

"He made who cry, Sidney?" Jo quietly asked. 

"Her. The nice lady with the nice hair," he replied. "She was nice to me but he shouldn't have done what he did, making her cry all the time." He looked down at Seth. "He wasn't nice to you, either," Sidney stated. 

Seth focused on the crime solvers. "Look, my brother doesn't always understand some things. Hey, are you even allowed to question him, without a lawyer or without reading his rights to him?" 

"He's not under arrest," Jo replied to Seth. "We're just here to ask some questions. Like who is the nice lady he's referring to?" 

"I, I don't know, but you can't --- " 

"Was the nice lady his wife?" Henry asked Sidney, stepping closer to him. Sidney hesitated before nodding. "And he hurt her," Henry added. 

"He made her cry," Sidney repeated. 

"You wanted to make him stop hurting her, didn't you?" Henry prodded. Sidney pulled his lower lip in and looked imploringly at his brother and then nodded. "You wanted to make him stop hurting your brother, too." As Henry spoke, he crept closer to Seth, keeping his eyes on Sidney. His partners cringed as they watched, preferring that he remained behind them. Especially Jo and Hanson, preferring that he not pull one of his stunts in front of Reece. _'So much for promising to be on his best behavior,'_ Jo ruefully told herself. But he seemed to be on to something, as usual, so they braced themselves as he explored a theory. 

"You just wanted her, Mrs. Davidson, to be happy ... with your brother." 

"M-my brother tried to talk to Mr. Davidson but he got so mad and he started choking Seth." 

"And you couldn't let him do that," Henry said. His gaze dropped to Sidney's large hands. 

Seth was growing more and more troubled at their interest in his brother. "No, you're wrong. I did it. I killed Todd." 

"I beg to differ," Henry objected. "The person who killed Todd Davidson was a very strong individual, much stronger than you." Seth protested but Henry pressed on. "Todd grabbed you like this." 

Henry suddenly clutched Seth by the throat which caused Sidney to react violently. He wrapped his arm around Henry's neck and dragged him away from his brother like he was a rag doll. He found himself unable to move or speak and his air supply was effectively cut off. Willing himself not to panic, he hoped that the others would free him before the inevitable happened. Dying and vanishing in front of them had not been part of his plan today or ever. As he began to lose consciousness, their voices had grown muffled, their worried faces had dimmed. Then, he felt himself being lowered to the floor and he coughed and sputtered back to full awareness. He was sure that he'd heard several curse words mostly leveled at him so he kept his eyes shut and continued to take in much-needed air. 

vvvv 

Abe's Antiques later on that same evening ... 

Abe's laughter rang out once again as he glanced off and on at his father's pinched face. "You almost died in front of the Lieutenant?!" Henry closed his eyes and slowly hissed a breath in and out through clenched teeth but said nothing. "Whatever happened to being on your best behavior?" 

"We were trying to catch a killer," he finally replied. "Which we did. I was merely caught off guard, is all. One can only hope that the court would take the young man's mentally challenged condition into consideration." 

Abe sputtered through the rest of his laughter. "Good thing they managed to pry Mr. Muscles off of you or you would have had a whole lot of explaining to do if you didn't head for the hills." 

"Yes, I know," Henry conceded and took another sip of after-dinner brandy. 

"And I'll bet Jo was pissed." Henry acknowledged that she was. "And I'll bet she still is." 

"Yes, Abraham, she still is and most likely will be for some time," Henry replied, irritated. "But I don't want to belabor the point. What's done is done. We caught the killer ... that's all that should really matter." 

"Except you also showed your butt --- er, that is, displayed your quirky ways in front of their boss, the Lieutenant. She's gonna be riding along with you guys for the rest of the week. You gotta be more careful, Pops," Abe cautioned him. 

"You're right, Abraham," Henry replied with a sigh. "Perhaps I should take Jo's advice and call out sick for the remainder of the week." 

"It would not be unexpected since he nearly squeezed your head off!" Abe chortled. After a few moments, his brow knitted and he asked, "How exactly did they manage to get him off of you, anyway?" 

Henry smiled and gave a quick laugh. "It was actually the Lieutenant who provided the much-needed leverage." Abe frowned deeper in disbelief. "You see, she merely pulled his baby finger back and that bit of counter-pull became so uncomfortable for him, too uncomfortable for him to maintain his grasp on me. He released his hold, giving the others a chance to subdue him." He smiled again. "Quite clever. I must remember that move in the future." He took another sip of his brandy. 

"Just the little finger, huh?" Abe remarked, amused. "I must remember that, too, for the next time the Frenchman and I --- " He chose not to complete his thought, clearing his throat and averting his eyes from his father's scowl of disapproval. 

In her Washington Heights home, a fuming Jo stood in her living room with her arms crossed, wondering if she shouldn't call out sick for the rest of the week. That way she could avoid seeing Henry get killed by a suspect and/or fired for being so reckless. In the next minute, she realized that she would be there. She had to be. She just had to try harder to make him understand that they were the cops, they took the risks. And not in front of her boss, dammit! She plopped down on the sofa and picked up the remote and unmuted the TV program in progress, a dance competition. Throwing the remote down onto the sofa, she sighed heavily and wondered again why their ME had no apparent sense of self-preservation.

"What am I to do with you, Henry?"

An image of his handsome, smiling face and those irresistible puppy dog eyes came to her perking up her own smile. "What would I ever do without you?" 

In the Hanson household, Mike recounted the day's events to his enthralled wife, Karen. His laughter rumbled up from his belly as he practically inhaled their delicious prime rib dinner and peach cobbler for dessert. He abruptly stopped chewing a morsel of pie when she told him that she had to meet him. 

"Bring him over for dinner one night," she said, her smiling blue eyes sparkling. 

"Uh, I dunno if that's such a good idea," he grumbled. "Not sure if I wanna, you know, buddy up to him. He's too weird." 

"Either you invite him or I will," she told him. When he appeared to relent, she added, "And sounds like you'd better make it soon before he gets himself killed." 

In Joanna Reece's home, she relaxed on the bed she shared with her husband, Morris, a retired, disabled firefighter. They watched the same dance competition TV show that Jo was watching. She wanted to make sure to compare notes on the results with her detective the next day. She also wanted to make sure to have a talk with their ME, as well, in order to get him to understand that his efforts were always appreciated because they produced results; but that they were the cops. They took the risks and he was not indestructible. She was not going to have him die on her watch!   
___________________  
Notes:   
Slight reference to "Forever" 2014 TV show S01/E10 episode The Man in the Killer Suit that aired 2 Dec 2014 on ABC TV network.   
Partial dialogue in the kitchen crime scene was inspired by dialogue from the "Perry Mason" TV show S02/E13 episode entitled The Case of the Borrowed Brunette.   
Information on choke holds found at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chokehold

The bit about pulling the baby finger back and making it uncomfortable for an assailant to maintain their choke hold on a person is from an episode of the Kung Fu TV series that aired over the ABC Network in the 1970s. For those who don't know, it was an American action-adventure martial arts western drama television series starring David Carradine. The series followed the adventures of Kwai Chang Caine, a Shaolin monk who traveled through the American Old West, armed only with his spiritual training and his skill in martial arts, as he sought Danny Caine, his half-brother. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kung_Fu_(TV_series) 


	3. Ride-Along with Reece Ch 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Team Morgan (minus Lucas and Abe) close one case and move on to the next but they split up this time. Keep it together, Henry.

Todd Davidson's murderer was apprehended, thanks to Henry's astute observations. The last being the bruises on Seth Frieburg's neck indicative of a strangle hold he'd recently endured. Scratches on the back of Davidson's right hand and bruising on the wrist were consistent with someone having tried to free themselves from his grasp; that someone being Seth. His brother, Sidney, had stepped in to save his brother but not knowing his own strength, had choked Davidson to death. Seth, when asked why Sidney was even present with him when he'd visited the Davidson home, had replied that he couldn't let his brother be alone very much. 

"Guess that was the real reason Tyne Davidson had chosen to break things off with young Seth," Reece speculated as she entered her office. "He may have been his brother's keeper but she didn't feel the need to be." 

"Mmm, perhaps," Henry replied, following her into her office along with Jo and Hanson. "I believe that when she told us that she had been trying to keep them away from us, she was referring to her young lover and his brother. Not her son, Stewart." 

"Well, if she was willing to help care for Sidney," Hanson began, "why dump Seth?" 

"The age difference," Reece concluded. "According to Seth, she couldn't take the stares and unkind comments from others whenever they tried to go out in public together." She noticed Henry stiffen once again as he had the day before when they'd first questioned Seth. The fact that he had voiced no opinion on it as the others had, didn't particularly concern her but it did surprise her a little bit. He being so quick to share his opinions on many subjects and situations. She dismissed his reticence, however, on a simple desire --- for whatever reason --- not to weigh in on the subject. 

"Can't say I'd react much differently if it were my Mom," Hanson admitted. He shrugged and looked at the others. "Just ... bein' honest." 

Jo, on the other hand, folded her arms across her chest and expressed the same opinion she had the day before. "You're saying that if your Mom found true love with a guy who happened to be several years her junior, you would make her miserable just to make yourself happy?" Hanson opened his mouth to reply but Jo continued. "What if by some miracle you stopped aging but Karen didn't. You're saying you'd stop loving her? You'd dump her?" 

"No! Of course not," Hanson replied. "I'd still love her. I'll always love her." He frowned at the others and asked, "How'd we get on this subject, anyway? We closed the case and we go on to the next one." As if anything fantastical like that would happen at all, he told himself. 

Henry set his lips tightly together and eyed Jo with a look of hopeful consideration. Whether she knew it or not, her remarks the day before and just now had bolstered his courage enough for him to lean more toward sharing his secret with her. At least, there was a good chance that she wouldn't leave him like Abigail had. But he felt that he was getting ahead of himself. In order for them to even begin a relationship, he had to be sure that she cared for him as much as he cared for her. Until then ... on to the next mystery, as usual. Lt. Reece's voice snapped him out of his musings. 

"Doctor? Doctor." 

"Oh, sorry, Lieutenant," he apologized, shaking his head. "You were saying?" 

"How much longer before you receive the toxicology report in the Grant Winston case?" Reece asked. He responded that he hoped it would be later on in the day although the man's symptoms pointed to the Monkeypox virus that his wife, Jean, had succumbed to only days before he'd fallen ill. 

"Well, we don't wait for that but let me know as soon as it comes in," she told him. "Hopefully, he can hang in there and not become our latest victim." The others nodded somberly. "In the meantime, his stepson, Andre, and stepdaughter, Amelia, must still be questioned again, am I right?" she asked them. They all nodded in the affirmative. "Good. Let's get on that." She paused, taking a breath. "Hard to believe that that poor man is lying in a hospital bed waiting to die after being bitten by a rat. I was bitten on my cheek when I was a toddler and I'm still here. Never got sick from it, either. "Course, it ... was a little mouse." 

"Wasn't just any rat," Jo reminded her, clearly upset at the thought of Winston's slow march to a probable death. 

Nearly two months ago, Winston's two stepchildren had returned from a vacation in Florida. They had brought back a new pet in the form of what they thought was a small, gray marsupial. Despite Winston's reservations about keeping it and doubting that it even was a marsupial, he relented in an effort to keep the peace with his wife and his usually obstinate and unyielding stepchildren. Three weeks later, however, it had gotten out of its cage and bitten his wife, Jean, on her right ankle and him on his right hand before being recaptured and locked up again. His wife, a diabetic and recent breast cancer survivor, had developed and succumbed to flu-like symptoms in less than a week. Five days after that, Winston had begun manifesting flu-like symptoms, as well. In another week, his condition had worsened, prompting a trip to the ER where he was diagnosed with Monkey Pox, a disease similar to smallpox. 

"Smallpox. That's ugly," Hanson said, grimacing. "Monkeypox. Never heard of that but it sounds even uglier." 

"Ugly, indeed," Henry agreed. "Monkeypox is an infectious disease caused by the virus of the same name that can occur in certain rodents in Africa called the Gambian pouch rat." 

"A pouch. No wonder they mistook it for some kind of pleasant little marsupial," Reece said, shuddering. 

"Symptoms begin with fever, headache, muscle pains, swollen lymph nodes, general tiredness, followed by a rash that forms blisters and crusts over," Henry stated. "The time from exposure to onset of symptoms is around ten days. The duration of symptoms is typically two to five weeks." He also named several ways by which Monkeypox could be spread, including an animal bite or scratch. "Diagnosis can be confirmed by testing a lesion for the virus' DNA. The disease can even appear similar to chickenpox."

"It's a wonder their kids didn't get sick, too," Jo said. 

"The smallpox vaccine is believed to prevent infection," Henry supplied. "It's quite possible that they were recently vaccinated since Madagascar and South Africa were the last places they'd visited before their trip to Florida." 

"Good thing there's a cure, then," Jo said, relieved. 

"Oh, there is no known cure," Henry sadly assured her. "But Cidofovir or Brincidofovir may be useful as a treatment. The risk of death in those infected is up to 10%." 

"Let's hope that Grant Winston has a fighting chance for recovery," Reece stated. 

Switching gears somewhat, she reminded them that she was there to ride along with all of them and not to take the lead in any of their investigations. "Although you can expect my input from time to time," she said. "So, just proceed as you normally would." 

The two detectives looked at each other then at their ME. "Well, it would save time if we split up," Jo proposed. Before she could suggest how they would, their boss agreed and suggested that Jo and Hanson go interview the stepdaughter where she was enrolled at a veterinary college on East 66th Street in Manhattan. None of them wanted to jump to conclusions since the young woman's chosen field of study could simply be coincidental. 

"Henry and I will interview the stepson at the tattoo parlor he runs." Jo and Henry exchanged a look of surprise while Hanson's eyes widened with concern. "Don't worry, you guys," Reece told her detectives with a smile. "I'll take good care of the good doctor." 

Jo and Hanson both gulped, nodded, and fought to keep their features calm as they left the bullpen, both of them praying that Henry "behaved" this time while out with their boss. Henry watched them wistfully as they left while he remained in Reece's office. He turned his attention to her when she cleared her throat. 

"Before we leave, Doctor," she began. "I want to be sure that you understand that we appreciate your efforts in helping us to apprehend suspects." He pursed his lips and dipped his head once. "That being said, I strongly suggest that you refrain from pulling another stunt like you did yesterday. We are the cops. We have the weapons. We take the risks. We are sworn to keep the public and you safe. Not the other way around. Understood?" He smiled this time when he dipped his head. "Good. Let's hit the road." 

Once they got into Reece's assigned vehicle, they mapped out the directions in GPS to the tattoo parlor. Neither could help but notice with more than a bit of irony that it was a place called East River Ink and located very near the vicinity of some of Henry's several arrests near the East River. 

"Try not to get too mesmerized by that river, Doctor," Reece cautioned him. When he failed to respond, she looked over at him and said, "Just kidding, no offense. I can do humor." 

"No offense taken," he reluctantly replied. He really wasn't offended but just deep in thought about when he would be able to get Jo alone so he could come clean with her. Uppermost in his mind was to share the secret of his condition with her. Secondly, although, just as important, was to find out if she cared anything about him at all beyond friendship. Another thing on his mind was Lucas having told him earlier that the Lieutenant wouldn't hesitate to wing him if he stepped out of line.   
________________________   
**Author's Notes:** (or rather, apologies). This chapter is very short because I wanted to post at least something now that I've recovered from another bout of flu virus and before jaunting off to my physical therapy appointment. Please forgive me and hope you enjoy.

  
**References: **  
Information on the Gambian pouched rat (Cricetomys gambianus), also known as the African giant pouched rat, found on wiki pedia. "The animals are sometimes kept as pets, but some have escaped from captivity and become an invasive species in Florida. The CDC and FDA in the US now ban the importation of this species. It is also blamed for an outbreak of monkeypox." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gambian_pouched_rat   
Information on the Monkeypox virus also found on wiki pedia


	4. Ride-Along with Reece Ch 4 Oh, Behave!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yes, it happens and right in front of Reece. But did she really see what she thought she saw?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do not own "Forever" TV 2014-2015 show or any of its characters.

Jo and Hanson entered the veterinary college where Grant Winston's stepdaughter, Amelia Dunbar, was enrolled. They identified themselves to the people in the Admissions Office and were provided with her whereabouts on campus. As they walked across the inside courtyard to her class on the other side of it, they both looked around and wondered why they'd never noticed the building or had even heard of it. 

The pet involved in the investigation and walking around the veterinarian school brought up other images of small, furry animals to Jo. "Did you ever get your boys the puppy they asked for?" she asked Hanson. 

He grunted. "No. Gotta save up enough money for the early burial in a pet cemetery first," he dryly joked. He grunted again and gave a quick shake of his head. "Poor pup'd be dead in less than a month."

Jo couldn't believe her ears. "Can't believe that they're that dangerous, Mike! Give 'em a chance; help 'em along!" 

The tall, dark-haired man shook his head, pressing his lower lip up against his top lip. "Nah. Not after what they did to the goldfish. And the garter snake. AND the gopher." Before she could respond, they'd arrived at Amelia's class just as the students were pouring out of it. Amelia recognized them as she exited the doorway and pulled to one side with a sigh as they came to stand in front of her. 

"More questions?" she asked tiredly as she shifted the strap of her bookbag on her shoulder. "I was on my way to see our lawyer about Mom's estate. Turns out there was a pre-nup so my brother and I won't be left out in the cold after all." 

"Mmm. Just a few more questions," Jo replied. "Not on the best of terms with your stepfather, I take?" 

"Let's just say that I liked him better when he was our chauffeur." She grumbled under her breath that her mother's marriage to him was an embarrassment in front of her friends. 

"His illness has prevented us from questioning him," Jo stated. "But if he signed a prenuptial agreement, that should say something good about him." 

"I suppose," Amelia replied, shrugging. "I'm sorry he's sick and might die but --- whatever he gets from Mom's estate is more than what he'd ever make in a lifetime off a chauffeur's income." 

"When did you find out about the pre-nup?" Hanson asked. 

"Just this morning before I came to class," Amelia replied. "Our attorney called me." 

"So you were afraid that your stepfather would inherit all of your mother's estate and that's why you brought a dangerous, poisonous animal into your home so they'd both die from a bite or scratch from that rat." 

Amelia sighed and sat down at one of the picnic-style tables in the courtyard. She tossed her thick, dark, tresses over her shoulder (a more aggressive form of moving her hair away from her face than Jo's perching a few stray strands behind her ear). "I loved my mother. I'd never do anything like that! And I'd never do anything like that to Grant, either. Geez, I didn't know it was just a rat. It looked like some kind of ... exotic gopher." Sorrow and guilt were evident in her eyes as she looked up at them as they stood over her. She let out a wry chuckle. "It looked cute. Harmless. If I'd known what it was, I would have left it in Florida where my brother found it. It was just a mistake, an awful mistake that it got loose and bit anyone." 

The two detectives looked at each other, skeptical of her sincerity, then back at her. "You're studying to be a veterinarian," Hanson countered. "How come you didn't know what it really was?" 

"Uh, yeah, studying," she replied indignantly. "Not an expert on every non-human animal on the planet!" She took in a breath through clenched teeth and blew it out through her nose. "It killed my Mom!" She shook her head. "I'll never forgive myself for being so stupid." Her brows knitted and her brown eyes moved slowly from side to side. "Still don't understand how or when Grant got bitten, though." 

"What do you mean?" Jo asked. "They weren't attacked at the same time?" 

Amelia shook her head. "No. I was there when it got loose and bit Mom before I managed to get it back into its cage. Grant wasn't even at home. He had a doctor's appointment." 

Both detectives added that new information to their individual notes. "Where was your brother when your mother was attacked?" Hanson asked. 

"I dunno. But he brought that dingbat girlfriend of his home with him right when Mom was being taken to the hospital," she replied. 

"What's this ... dingbat girlfriend's name?" Jo asked, holding back a snarky tone to her voice. 

"Missy, um, Enright," Amelia replied. "Lives and works in Brooklyn. She's poor." Her disapproval of her brother's relationship with the woman was obvious. 

"You think she's a golddigger, too?" Jo asked. 

"Not so much as that but ... " Amelia paused and pulled her lips in. She sighed and continued. "She acts like some kind of ... mindless dummy around my brother. Like she can't think for herself. It's embarrassing! I mean, he's my brother and I love him but I don't like the way that she jumps at his beck and call." She paused again. "And I don't think he really loves her but she, she's really hooked on him." 

"Do you know how we can reach her?" Jo asked. Amelia asked why. "We want to find out what she might know about any of this." Amelia told them that Missy worked at a coffee shop called The Playground, on Bedford in Brooklyn. Jo jotted the information down on her notepad. 

"Getting back to your stepdad," Hanson began, "exactly when was he attacked?" 

"It was ... must have been some time later on that same night as Mom was or early the next morning," Amelia replied. "I stayed with Mom at the hospital for the next few days until ... until she died." When asked how the animal could have gotten out of its cage again, she tensed before responding that she had no idea. 

"C'mon, you must have some idea," Hanson prodded her. "Were you the only one responsible for caring for the animal?" 

Amelia schooled her features and abruptly stood up, grabbing her bookbag. "Just me. But I wasn't there that night. I stayed with Mom at the hospital." The 20-year-old appeared to visibly deflate at the memory of her mother's suffering and passing. A few moments later, she managed to stop the unraveling of her emotions. "Look, if you have any other questions, talk to our family attorney, Lawrence Dunbar. His office is on Park Avenue." With that, she briskly walked away from them across the courtyard toward the street to hail a cab. 

The detectives watched her as they began to leave, as well. "Missy's prince came along in the form of the brother," Mike said with a smirk. "Meanwhile, the chauffeur went from driving Miss Daisy to riding Miss --,"- " 

"Save it!" Jo warned him, palming him but working hard to keep her smile muscles under control. He was just as bad as her own brother with the way he thought sometimes. 

Hanson chuckled but apologized. Normally, their next step would have been to go question Amelia's brother again, to pinpoint his whereabouts when their stepfather was attacked by the poisonous animal. But since the other half of their foursome had that covered, they felt the need to question the household staff again as well as Missy. Just then, she received a call from Reece on her cell phone. After a short exchange, she ended the call and informed Hanson that Reece and Henry were on their way to question Missy Enright so she and Hanson would check out the household staff. They made plans to all meet up again later on that day and compare notes. 

As Jo and Hanson motored over to the Winston home, they couldn't help but wonder if (and hope) that their ME continued to behave himself. The fact that Reece had not phoned them yet with any reports of Henry behaving oddly or getting hurt, encouraged them that their second day of this ride-along was going more smoothly than the first. 

vvvv 

Neither Reece nor Henry knew what to expect when they entered the tattoo establishment. She had never been interested in tattoos so had never visited a place like this. He, however, was familiar with this form of body art, although he had never visited this type of establishment. Sometimes he wished that he still had that anchor tattoo on his upper left arm, placed there during his days in the British Navy in the late 1700s by a mildly-drunk seaman under less-than-sanitary conditions aboard ship. He'd agreed to having it done after too many swigs of rum and a dare made by his fellow midshipmen. Among other things, it had greatly dismayed him that the colorful anchor had vanished from his body after his first death in 1814. Of course, he could share none of this with the Lieutenant or any of his other colleagues. Not even Abe knew. A tattoo? He would never hear the end of it from his sometimes mildly harassing son. 

The tattoo studio was surprisingly as clean and well lit as any upscale hair salon. The black and white tiled floor gleamed. Five "stations", three on the left and two on the right, hugged the walls of the shotgun-style room with black leather barber-style chairs that also reclined. The small shelving along the walls held the tubes of both black and colored inks, needles, and the tattooing machines. Various portraits adorned the walls showcasing the intricate designs that past customers now proudly sported on different parts of their bodies. They identified themselves to the only tattoo artist in the shop, a young African-American woman who identified herself as Jendayi. She only briefly took her eyes off of her customer to acknowledge them and tell them which station belonged to Andre. 

"Last one," she told them. "But I started here two months ago and he hasn't been here since his mother died." 

"Does he even still work here?" Reece asked her. 

"His stuff is still there," she replied. "Frankly, I don't know why he would be working here at all seeing as how he comes from such a wealthy family." She shrugged. "Slumming, I guess. Maybe he came into his inheritance since his mother died and his stepfather is about to blink out, too," she speculated while putting the finishing touches on her design and straightened up. They waited while the customer first admired her arm tattoo of a darkly-clad female vampire with the wings of an eagle and a sinister smile with bloodied fangs. Satisfied, the pink-mohawked customer paid and happily left while admiring her new permanent body decoration. 

"Jendayi," Henry repeated, his head tilted and a whimsical smile on his lips. "Lovely name." 

"Thanks. It's African or Egyptian. It means --- " she was interrupted by Henry. 

"Thankful or give thanks," he confidently finished for her. 

Jendayi eyed him. "I'm impressed." Reece was impressed too but not surprised that Henry's well of knowledge included the meanings of African/Egyptian names. Jendayi began prepping for her next customer. 

"You, ah, seem to know a lot about him and his family's recent troubles," Henry pointed out.

"He doesn't talk much but he talked enough to share that with me," she replied. "You're welcome to wait for him if you like but it could be a long wait." 

Reece thanked her and joined Henry, who had unexpectedly left her side and now stood inspecting Andre's station. Unlike the others, his appeared to have accumulated a layer of dust on the shelves and equipment. Henry swiped up a wad of dust from the shelf with his left index finger and rubbed his thumb into it. "Hmmm. Quite an accumulation of dust," he muttered to Reece. "More than two weeks' worth, consistent with the time period since his mother's illness and death." 

A small, frayed-edged photo stuck into one edge of the wall mirror above the shelf caught their attention. The photo showed a beaming Andre and an attractive young auburn-haired woman standing in front of a Coney Island hotdog stand. Henry unlodged it and they both scrutinized it before he flipped it over to see "Me & Missy" scrawled on the back. 

"Girlfriend?" Reece speculated. 

"Possibly," Henry replied. "We find out who this Missy is and we possibly find him." 

"Okay, so you found me." They snatched their heads toward the sound of Andre's voice, clearly annoyed. He walked up to them and held out his hand. "I'll thank you to give me that." Henry gave the photo to him and they stepped aside as Andre began to pull a few other photos and postcards out of the mirror's edges. "My sister warned me that somebody from the NYPD might come snooping around here." He stuffed the items into a pocket of his brown leather bomber jacket and looked at both of them. 

"What else do you want from me? My Mom's dead. Her husband --- if you can call him that --- will soon be," he said without compassion. 

"He'd been your family's chauffeur prior to marrying your mother," Henry stated. 

"How did that make you feel when she married one of the servants?" Reece asked. 

"How do you think it made me feel? Of all the people in the world to marry and she chooses a damn servant," he hissed. 

"Were you there when your stepfather was attacked?" Reece asked him. 

"Yeah. But I was asleep," he replied. "Didn't know a thing about it until the next morning." He looked from one to the other and said, "You can check with the staff. I never left my room after I ate dinner. Sis was at the hospital with Mom so ... there was no need for me to be there, too," he added with a shrug. 

"We will check with the staff," Henry assured him. "But tell me why do you choose to work here when you could be off yachting or vacationing in some paradise?" 

"We're not that kinda rich," he replied as he gathered a few more small items from off of the shelf and from out of the small compartments underneath. "Not lazy rich," he explained, throwing a hand up. "My sister and I were raised to pull our own weight, make our own way through life. Not depend on any inheritance we might come into one day." 

"Admirable," Henry said, recalling his own upbringing that emphasized similar values for his siblings and him. He took note of the young man's apparent sullen nature, though, and seeming lack of regard for his stepfather. There was also no evidence of mourning or grief over his late mother, which he found to be despicable. "It still won't hurt to have your inheritance maybe a little sooner than you'd expected, right?" 

Andre's eyes darkened as he looked at Henry. "No, it won't hurt," he agreed with a gritty tone in his voice. "But my sister and I won't get it until we've reached the age of 30. No pre-nup invalidates that. So, you see, it would do us no good to harm my mother or Grant now. What bothered me the most was Mom being married to our servant." 

"Former servant," Henry corrected him. 

"Once a servant, always a servant to me," he muttered. 

"What I'd like to know is how were you and your sister ever allowed to get the Gambian rat past law enforcement and bring it across state lines in the first place?" Reece asked. 

"Guess they didn't know what it was, either," Andre responded, shrugging. "Nobody told us that it was illegal or poisonous. We're not crazy! And we're certainly not that greedy. I already told you. We weren't raised like that." 

Henry asked who the young woman was in the Coney Island photo and Andre responded that it was his girlfriend, Missy Enright. 

"Missy. Short for Melissa," Henry stated. Andre nodded and said that she had spent the night with him in his bedroom the night that his stepfather was attacked. "She was with you all night in your room, as well?" Henry asked. 

"Well ... yeah, sure." Andre looked at them and added, "She must have been. She was there when I woke up the next morning. In fact, she woke me up." He shook his head and grinned slightly. "Guess I had too much to drink the night before." He frowned slightly. "I only had one glass of wine, though. Normally, one glass doesn't do me in like that." 

Reece and Henry left the tattoo parlor and got into her car again. She started up the car and called Melissa's cell phone but got voicemail. She left her callback information and ended the call and wheeled the car away from the curb into traffic. When Henry asked why she didn't just send some unis to pick Melissa up and bring her in for questioning, Reece replied that she wanted to see where the young woman lived. The address sounded familiar. 

"Curiosity. Her address is not in one of the best neighborhoods, if I correctly recall," she explained. "This Melissa must be enjoying some kind of Cinderella story herself being romantically involved with a rich young guy like Andre. And if her roommates are as gossipy as mine were, they should have some juicy details to share," she said with a wink. 

Henry raised his eyebrows and looked over at the Lieutenant. "You know," he began, "if I didn't already enjoy a great working relationship with Det. Martinez, I would not be averse to partnering with you, Lieutenant." 

She chuckled and thanked him. Then she said, "And thank you for not giving me another heart attack like you did yesterday. You questioned him calmly and professionally." She glanced at him then back at the road ahead. "Cool-headed investigative work. That's what I like." 

Henry smiled, inwardly pleased with himself that he had, so far, managed to 'behave'. "Ah, Lieutenant. Did you catch what Andre said about having only one glass of wine that seemed to have caused him to sleep deeper through the night?" 

"Yes," she replied. "Sounds like he might have been helped along to sleep by someone." She shook her head. "Too bad we didn't know that when he was first questioned. A tox screen wouldn't show anything in his system at this point." 

"Assuming he was telling the truth," Henry said. "The sooner we speak with Melissa the better. And I assume that the detectives will question the household staff further, as well." 

"I'm sure they're on top of things," she agreed. "After we speak to his girlfriend, we can hook back up with them and compare notes." 

A little more than 15 minutes later, they reached their destination, parking in front of the Brooklyn brownstone on Bedford Ave where Andre had told them Melissa lived with two other roommates. Once they announced themselves, though, they were told that she had left after receiving a call. They assumed it was from her boyfriend, Andre. Reece asked to be let in anyway, which they did. She and Henry eventually made their way into their apartment. 

"Do you know where she went?" Reece asked. 

"Just down the street to the park where they usually meet," Portia Lane, one of the roommates said. "Their special place to meet and ... make plans," she added. Portia hestitated a couple of seconds then replied, "Wedding plans, most likely." 

"More than that," the other roommate, Cynthia Babineaux, chimed in. "Plans to spend his old lady's money once she died. Now that she is dead ... it'll only be a matter of time before the champagne starts to flow." 

"Do I detect a note of jealousy?" Reece ventured. 

"Because she's involved with Andre?" Cynthia asked. "Get real," she said, rolling her eyes. "He's as much of a rat as that weird pet he brought back from Florida." 

Reece and Henry's eyebrows quickly dropped down into frowns. "You know about the animal?" Henry asked. 

"Yeah," Cynthia replied. "I saw her Googling it a few months ago. Said she was just curious but dang if that same type of animal didn't later off Andre's mom and attack his stepfather." 

"Andre and his sister both claim that they were ignorant as to the true nature of the animal, thinking it posed no danger to anyone," Henry told her. 

"Oh, well, maybe to that so-called veterinarian school sister of his," Cynthia replied. "But Missy had to tell him. She told him everything, helped him do everything. He's got her wrapped around his little finger. And for what? He's just gonna dump her once he gets his money. Missy might have bought all that 'working class rich' crap that he laid on her but I don't." 

"You mentioned that your roommate and her boyfriend might soon be celebrating because of his impending inheritance," Henry began. "According to him, neither he nor his sister will get anything until they reach the age of 30." 

Cynthia and Portia exchanged looks of surprise. Then, Cynthia said, "Missy didn't seem to know that. She would sit up and daydream about not being poor anymore and traveling the world, living like a princess once his mother was out of the way. After his mother married their chauffeur six months ago, she got really down for a while. Then one day she perked up again. Said that all her dreams were still gonna come true." 

Reece and Henry hurriedly left the apartment and drove down the street to the park where Melissa was thought to be meeting with Andre. It only took a few minutes and once they arrived, they parked and ran down the paved entrance into the park. Their eyes roamed over the thankfully small respite area and spotted a young woman who matched the woman in the photo with Andre. She appeared to be having an animated conversation with another young woman they recognized as Andre's sister, Amelia, near one of the park benches. As they briskly approached the two women, they broke out into a run when Melissa's eyes widened in horror and Amelia pulled a gun on her. 

Reece shouted "Police!" when it looked like Henry would reach them first. She cursed herself under her breath for having prematurely thanked him for his good behavior today. "Keep away, Doctor! Keep. Away!" she shouted to him. 

Henry, breathing heavily from his run, abruptly but reluctantly stopped and backed off. He kept his eyes trained on Amelia, who kept the gun pointed at a very frightened Melissa. Henry obediently allowed the Lieutenant to step in front of him as she gripped her weapon with both hands and aimed it at Amelia. He had no intentions to allow anyone to be harmed, though, if he played his cards right. 

"I'm Lt. Joanna Reece NYPD," she announced, holding up her badge attached to a lanyard around her neck. "Drop the gun," Reece firmly commanded as she released her badge and gripped her gun with both hands again. "Don't do anything stupid. Do as I tell you and no one will get hurt." 

"She killed my Mom," Amelia told them, her voice shaky and angry. "I figured it out when I was talking to those other detectives a little while ago. She gave my brother the information on where to find that damn rat thing in Florida. Didn't you?!" she yelled, causing Melissa to jump and cringe. "You'll do anything for him," she hissed at her. "Anything! You moron!" 

"We can talk about all of this later," Reece told Amelia while keeping her voice calm and steady. "Put the gun down. Don't make me use mine." 

"Please. Don't let her kill me," Melissa pleaded, her eyes darting between Amelia and Reece. "Shoot her!" she urged. 

Reece maintained a steady grip and eye on the two women but no longer felt Henry behind her. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him edge toward Melissa. Inwardly, she groaned and wondered what the hell he thought he was doing. If he was trying to help, why didn't he ease up behind the one holding the gun? "Calm down," she urged Melissa. "No one's going to shoot anyone. Isn't that right, Amelia?" 

"That's where you're wrong, Lieutenant," Amelia ground out. "She's gonna pay for helping my brother murder my mother." 

She raised the gun appearing to prepare to pull the trigger. Reece fired her weapon, striking the woman in the wrist. The weapon fell from her hand and fired just as it hit the ground. At the same time, Henry had tried to push Melissa out of the line of fire and they toppled to the ground in a heap. Reece quickly subdued Amelia and cuffed her. She kicked the weapon further away and called for a bus. 

"Doctor, are you two all right?" she asked Henry. 

He nodded and stood up, lending a hand to Melissa. Once she was on her feet, Reece restrained her with a pair of plastic zip tie restraints and Mirandized both women. Amelia, for attempted murder and firing a weapon in a public place. Melissa, for suspicion of murder and conspiracy to commit murder. Backup arrived and took charge of the two women so Reece and Henry got back into her car to head back to the precinct. 

During the drive, Henry began to feel the discomfort of increasing pain. He placed his left hand into the side of his coat and felt under his right armpit. The touch of his fingers caused him to wince and swallow. He pulled his hand out and saw blood on them. Blast! He had been hit by that stray bullet that had discharged from Amelia's gun when it hit the ground. His breathing was becoming more labored, making it difficult, if not impossible for him to respond to the Lieutenant as she ticked off other possible charges to be levied against the two women in custody and possibly Andre, too. He shut his eyes and tried to think what he should do at this point. Certainly, he didn't want to die and vanish in front of Reece! That just wouldn't do. It was too late to regret not having taken the whole week off. These circumstances faced him now. What to do? He could see that she was directing her attention to him now because of his non-responsiveness and perhaps his pale, sweaty appearance. 

The bullet had entered under his right armpit. Had it missed any vital organs? If he requested she take him to a hospital, would he live long enough to survive surgery? In the next moment, he knew that the inevitable was going to occur. His level of distress was rising rapidly. He wasn't going to make it much longer. She had asked him if he was okay. Now she was saying that she was running him over to Bellevue. No, not there. Adam was there. Anywhere else but there. But no. He could feel it now, the feel of death creeping up on him. In the next few seconds he would die and be gone, leaving Reece to wonder if she had lost her mind but for certain that his life would be over in New York. He tried to respond to her but he couldn't. Her voice sounded far away now. Everything was growing dark. And he felt cold; so cold. He was aware of a huge impact and knew that the sound of a crash should have been louder. A split second later, though, the familiar flash of images from his past and present began and ended quickly after he exhaled his last breath. 

Moments earlier ... 

"Doctor, are you okay?" Reece asked him. It worried her that he suddenly seemed so listless and unresponsive. She hoped that he hadn't injured himself when he'd pushed Melissa to the ground. God forbid that he had been hit by that stray bullet discharging. "Doctor! I'm running you over to Bellevue because something is definitely wrong with you." 

His breathing was fast becoming more labored, worrying her. Whatever was wrong with him, he didn't appear to be able to speak. Although a seasoned law enforcer for more than two decades, her resolve was admittedly shaken by her very unofficial and temporary partner apparently in distress. She activated the lights and siren on her vehicle. Her attention was divided between him and the road ahead but when an errant driver ignored the sirens and attempted to zoom past her through an intersection, she slammed on the brakes and swerved to the right in a vain attempt to avoid them. The edge of the driver side bumper connected loudly with the other car's left passenger door, demolishing it. Her car's airbags deployed and the additional impact dazed her into oblivion. The last thing she remembered before the oblivion overtook her was seeing white. The airbag ... or ... was there also a bright, white light? 

vvvv   
Her eyelids fluttered open as she fought her way out of the grogginess. There was the bright, white light again. No. Sunlight. Through the windows of --- she blinked and looked around at her surroundings --- her hospital room. Hospital. Bellevue. Henry! But ... there he was. Standing near the window with a look of tamed embarrassment on his face. 

"H-Henry," she managed to croak out. She swallowed to wet her dry throat. 

"You're awake! he gleefully noted. "I'll alert the nursing staff." He whisked himself away and out of her room before she could utter another word but he didn't return when the nurse arrived. 

"M-my colleague," she began. "Where is he?" 

"Let's get you looked after first," the nurse replied with a warm smile. "I'll notify your doctor that you're awake. And welcome back," she added, patting her arm before leaving. 

Reece relaxed into the soft pillows and closed her eyes. The memory of the car accident slowly came back to her. Apparently, she had been worried right before the impact that the good doctor had been in some kind of physical distress. But, apparently, she'd been mistaken. She knitted her brow as she recalled those few last moments. Yeah, she ... must have been mistaken. But while she waited for her doctor to come and examine her, she couldn't ignore what her gut was telling her. Rarely was it wrong. 

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX  
Notes:   
Name of Jendayi and meaning found at several sites including this one   
https://www.sheknows.com/baby-names/name/jendayi/   
Wasn't sure so I googled plastic handcuffs and found some info at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plastic_handcuffs


	5. Ride-Along with Reece Ch 5 Case Closed

_Reece couldn't ignore what her gut was telling her. Rarely was it wrong. _

vvvv 

The seasoned police Lieutenant assured herself again that she wasn't crazy. Henry had been there in the car next to her and then --- he hadn't been. Maybe. She blew out another sigh of exasperation, set a piping hot cup of overly-priced but delicious coffee on her desk, and sat down at it. The events of the day before, specifically the car accident, played over in her mind again. She recalled for nearly the 100th time that Henry had looked out of it, making her wonder if he had not caught a bullet when Amelia's gun had dropped from her hand and hit the ground. 

"No blood," she whispered to herself, frowning before taking a cautious sip from her steaming cup of coffee. "So, maybe he wasn't." 

She shook her head and heaved another deep sigh. Well, as much as she wanted to shake some concrete answers out of the man, she felt it best to bide her time. Catch him at the right moment. One thing she was sure of was the look of unmistakable apprehension in his eyes, despite his attempted bright smile, when she'd come out of her groggy daze in the hospital. Luckily, she'd come out of the crash with only a sore tongue, the result of having bitten the right side of it upon impact and after the airbag had deployed. EMT's at the scene had initially feared internal bleeding but the flow had checked itself rather quickly and after an overnight stay in the hospital, she'd been released. While her sister, Rena, had driven her home, she silently regretted her decision to accompany her detectives and their ME on their field outings. Then there was all the darn paperwork required because she'd fired her weapon. A knock at her office door interrupted her train of thought. "Come." 

Jo leaned into the open doorway and asked if she felt up to going out with them again that day. Honestly, she didn't. But she still managed a smile and an affirmative response. "Be out in a second," she told her. "Just need to check on something first." 

Jo nodded and closed the door, rejoining Hanson near their desks. Reece logged into her already open email and groaned at the reply from her contact in the city's red-light camera brigade. "Damn! The camera wasn't working??" Wasn't working due to recent vandalism by a disgruntled, recently-ticketed motorist. Surely, there had to be surveillance footage from some of the businesses near that intersection. Otherwise, how could she prove her suspicions that Henry had simply ... vanished? 

"Uggghhh! Time to get out of here, Miss Rash Decision of 2019," she wryly muttered. As she left her office and joined up with Jo and Hanson, she realized that a good part of being the boss meant that she could cut this week's ride-along short. Leave her detectives to deal with the good doctor and all of his strangeness. As much as that relieved her, it made her wonder if this sort of thing happened all the time and they had had to omit certain details from any of their reports --- just as she found herself doing in this particular instance. Something she had never done before. Because of that, she felt more than a little annoyed at Henry for making her feel the need to fabricate some details. 

"Where are we headed?" Reece asked them as they piled into Jo's car and motored away from the precinct. 

"Mt. Sinai over on Madison," Jo replied, keeping her eyes on the road in front of her. "Apparently, Grant Winston is conscious and his doctor has cleared us to talk with him." 

"Just the three of us today?" Reece asked. 

"Uh, yeah," Hanson replied. "Lucas said Doc won't be in. Family emergency," he added. 

"Oh, too bad," Reece said. "Hope everything's okay." And who were his family members, anyway? she asked herself, briefly pondering if his elderly roommate was one of them. There seemed to be so much that no one knew about him. 

vvvv 

The usually cool, calm, and collected Abe paced determinedly back and forth in front of his father, who watched him with a somber eye from his perch on the sofa in the living area. Abe was again expounding the now moot point of why his dad should have simply taken time off, that way avoiding being in close quarters with Lt. Reece that week. He stopped momentarily to ask if he was sure the Lieutenant hadn't witnessed his death and vanishing the day before. 

"Pretty sure," Henry replied. "Look, Abraham, she was quite dazed after the crash. And I overheard a patrolman at the hospital state that even though the red-light camera was inoperative, the female driver of the other car had immediately confessed that she was at fault. She's been charged with reckless driving." 

"Her bad luck to have hit a cop car," Abe muttered. "Her good luck to not have been charged with your murder!" He paused while they both silently pondered that unfathomable fact. "Okay, okay," Abe sighed. "Where does that leave the Lieutenant? With you not in the car with her, how could she have justified using her siren?" 

Henry worriedly pondered that point for a few moments. He then rubbed the back of his left hand under his chin a couple of times and sighed, resting his hand back in his lap. "I was in the car with her," he began, carefully choosing his words. "And I'm sure she'll ... come up with a valid reason for use of the siren." Abe slowly arched his eyes away from his father and shoved his fists onto his hips. Nevertheless, Henry continued. 

"After the impact, I was also dazed. Most likely got out of the car to help her but succumbed to my own maladies and ... " He looked at Abe as if to find help to complete his thought. 

Abe waited a few seconds, then said, "You're gonna feed her a lie, too, instead of the truth." His gaze remained set on his father, who left his seat and took his own turn at pacing. "Don't you think it's best that you come clean, Pops?" he asked. 

"I'm simply not ready for that, Abraham," Henry admitted with regret, pressing his lips together and avoiding his son's imploring gaze. 

"Guess I'd better help you work on the lie, too, then," Abe said with a sigh of dismay. 

vvvv 

Jo and Hanson entered Grant Winston's hospital room with their boss close behind them. They had been told that he was a bit stronger and that his color was a little better than when he'd first been admitted but he still looked like he was at death's door to them. Still, he was alive and his doctor assured them that he was on track to a full recovery. They identified themselves and slowly approached his bed just as he was finishing his breakfast. 

"Morning, Detectives," the balding man in his mid-50's quietly greeted them and swung the tray table out to the left and away from him. "What would you like to know?" he asked resignedly. 

"First of all, we're sorry for the loss of your wife," Reece softly replied. He smiled softly in response. "And your doctors tell us that you're gonna beat this." 

He slowly inhaled and exhaled. "Mrs. --- Jean --- was a good woman but ... she wasn't my wife. At least, not in every true sense of the word." His remarks served to confuse his three inquisitors. 

"Mind elaboratin' on that?" Hanson asked. 

"It was a marriage in name only," Grant explained. 

"Why?" Jo asked, frowning. 

"Said she wanted to be married, but couldn't find an ... appropriate mate. Wanted someone she could trust. Companionship," he explained further. 

"A marriage of convenience," Reece stated. 

"I went along with it," he replied. "Nothing much in it for me, mind you, because of the pre-nuptial agreement I signed." 

"Nothing much in it for you as far as her estate goes if you guys divorced," Hanson stated cynically. "But as her surviving spouse --- " Grant cut him off before he could finish. 

" --- I still get very little compared to the size of her vast fortune. That's the way the agreement read. Her will remained the same except she added that I should receive a modest annual stipend equal to my chauffeur's pay for the rest of my life. Oh, and ... ownership of her home in Orlando, Florida." He paused before adding, "Not an unbearable situation so I agreed to the charade." 

"Wasn't it uncomfortable being around her socialite friends and family members?" Reece asked. 

"She detested what she called those 'dreary little dinner parties'. Instead, she preferred quiet dinners at home. Companionship for her walks around the property or short trips on her yacht. The woman was just lonely and I was simply there for her." He appeared to move past the initial embarrassment of his own admissions and told them, "She was a good-hearted person. I never took advantage of her. We were just ... married friends." 

"Her son and daughter were aware of this peculiar arrangement the two of you had?" Reece asked. 

He shook his head. "They were not to know. I suppose that's why they stopped liking me. They actually thought I was a fortune-seeking former servant. I never even rose to the usually despised rank of stepfather in their minds." 

"Then why didn't they know?" Hanson asked. 

"She actually had planned to tell them but ... never got the chance," Grant replied. He closed his eyes and rested his head back into the pillows. "I'm ... feeling quite tired now, Detectives." 

"Sorry about that but we need to know how you were bitten and if you had anything to do with your wife's attack," Jo told him. 

His eyes remained closed but he wearily denied having anything to do with his wife's attack. That he only learned afterward that the animal was dangerous. "I mistakenly assumed that it was part of Miss Amelia's veterinary studies. And me? I woke up in the middle of the night to find it feeding on my hand!" He opened his eyes to look at them. "How it got into my bedroom, I do not know." 

"Why weren't you at the hospital with your critically ill wife?" Reece asked. 

"I arrived home after she'd been taken to the hospital. Miss Amelia had left explicit instructions with the housekeeper, Mrs. Saxon, for me to stay away. Knowing how deeply she resented me, I bowed to her wishes. Besides, Jean's injury had been described as just a scratch, the animal was back in its cage. I thought she would be back home in a few hours." 

"One last question," Hanson began. "Were the pre-nup and the will both drawn up by the same lawyer?" 

Grant swallowed and closed his eyes again. "Yes. By her nephew, Lawrence Dunbar." 

They left Grant's room with some answers but still more questions. "Let's have a talk with this lawyer of theirs," Hanson said. Jo and Reece both nodded. Jo got on her phone and called Dunbar's office. "Like to get a look at those papers," Hanson continued. "He apparently hid the truth about their mother's marriage from the kids, as well." 

The three of them piled into their assigned vehicle, this time with him driving. Jo buckled up and flipped open her small notepad and read the address of Dunbar's office out loud to him. As they drove, Hanson noted that at least they were able to "peel the layers off this weird onion" of a case. 

"Not like tryin'a get answers out of the Doc, right?" he asked rhetorically, not noticing how his two colleagues both cringed at the same time and shared a look. "Probably have better luck crackin' a safe than gettin' anything out of him," he chuckled. 

Reece, seated behind Hanson, quickly averted her eyes to the street scenes passing outside the car window on her left. Jo caught herself and quickly faced front again but was barely breathing. She'd seen something familiar in her boss' eyes. A look she'd seen in her own eyes after more than one curiously bad experience seeing Henry put himself in danger while cornering a suspect. Was it just the crash that had shaken her boss up or had he pulled another of his crazy stunts? She chanced a glance at Reece again only to find her doing the same. They looked away from each other again. But both women could feel that the other had something strange to share about their strange ME. Henry. Henry! Why hadn't he just taken the week off? Jo was shouting to herself but doing her best to remain outwardly calm. It was enough that she had covered for him more than once, omitting certain things from more than one report in order to protect either of them from reprimand or worse. Now, it was apparent that his actions, whatever they had been the day before, were possibly causing her boss to do the same with her own report. 

After a 20-minute drive that should have been ten minutes shorter, they emerged from the heavy traffic and soon found themselves in Dunbar's office but were informed by his young, raven-haired secretary, Nichelle, that he was in court. 

"Well, you could have told us that on the phone before we made the trip over here," Reece stated, slightly irritated. 

"You came to speak with him about his late aunt, Jean Dunbar, er, Winston," Nichelle stated. "Sorry. He was waiting for word on a verdict, it came in, and ... he rushed back to court." She suddenly stood up from her chair and announced that she had to go to the restroom and that it might take some time because of a certain medical condition. 

"I was just about to make a few updates to Mrs. Winston's will. The last secretary he had abruptly quit. Last I heard, she was getting pretty cozy with Mrs. Winston's son." She placed a hand on top of the legal documents next to her computer keyboard before leaving through a side door. 

They exchanged looks, each of them with Andre's girlfriend, Missy, on their minds. Reece, much to her detectives' surprise, then sat behind the computer and easily navigated through the legal brief software program to isolate the Winston will and pre-nup. 

"Couple of years ago, I completed an online paralegal course," she told them. "Never can tell when some of this legalese will come in handy." 

Hanson grinned and gave her a flash drive he'd confiscated from his elder son as a recent punishment and she quickly downloaded copies of the documents onto it. Feeling somewhat like kids who'd just gotten away with stealing cookies out of the cookie jar, they left the building and drove back to the precinct to study their stolen treat. 

vvvv 

Judge Hairston had signed the search warrant Reece had requested and after having pored over the legal documents and other evidence they'd obtained, the three of them emerged from a conference room at the back of the bullpen intent upon confronting their next targets for questioning: Lawrence Dunbar and his former secretary, Melissa Enright. Reece announced that her ride-along was prematurely ended but she would fall back into her supervisory capacity for the rest of the investigation. 

"Good thing you got the warrant," Jo said. "Just to cover our butts." 

A uni approached Reece and told her that Lawrence Dunbar, along with Melissa Enright, were waiting for them in the interview room. She decided to give Hanson first crack at them and he quickly walked ahead of them. Will and pre-nup in hand, he entered the interview room while Reece and Jo entered the viewing room on the other side of the glass. 

"Yes. How lucky we are," Reece dryly replied, referring to the warrant, as she and Jo stood in the viewing room. After a few moments, she asked, "Tell me, Detective. How many strange experiences have you had during an investigation when Dr. Morgan was with you?" 

Jo had both dreaded and expected a conversation like this with her boss. The fact that her boss was addressing Henry and her by their titles still made her stomach flip flop. It meant that she was not only curious but annoyed. He had done something. She released a sigh before replying. 

"He has a way of ... doing things that aren't exactly by the book but in the end we bag our perp." She attempted a slight smile then dropped it realizing this was a serious fishing expedition that could steer her into treacherous waters. 

"Can't argue with the fact that he's been a big help to us since he started joining you and Hanson in the field," Reece admitted. "But this putting himself in harm's way seemingly without a thought to his own safety simply cannot continue." 

Jo bit her lower lip before replying, "I ... yes. You're right but ... " 

"He doesn't listen," Reece finished for her. Jo bit her lip again nodding in reluctant agreement. 

"Henry's a civilian, not a trained investigator like we are. And his brand of eccentricity is very unique. He does get things done, though." She turned to face Jo. "Look ... I'm not asking you to give me any details of his past misbehavior. What's done is done. But for now, he stays in the morgue until further notice." That is, until she could find out from him what happened after the crash. 

Jo was both relieved and dismayed over her boss' decision. On the one hand, his presence and, therefore, his tendency to break out on his own wouldn't be a factor in their field investigations for a while. On the other hand, his presence and keen eye for things usually overlooked by her and others would be sorely missed. "We'll still be able to consult him," Jo stated, hopeful. 

"Oh, of course," Reece replied. "I may be annoyed with him but I'm not dumb." Or crazy, she told herself again. They turned their attention to the interrogation on the other side of the glass. 

"Yes, Aunt Jean's first husband, Phillip Dunbar, was my uncle," Lawrence replied to Hanson. "It's not unusual for a family member to act as attorney for one or more of them." 

"Yeah, but your father, Harold Dunbar, hadn't amassed a fortune like his brother, Phil," Hanson said. "When he died 11 years ago, your aunt and uncle paid to bury him. They also pay to put you through college?" he asked. 

"Yes, they paid for my father's final expenses, but I obtained scholarships and worked my way through college," the sandy-haired attorney in his early 30's replied. 

"Yeah, nose to the grindstone and all that," Hanson quickly shot back. He then opened a folder in front of him and plucked a sheet of paper from it, sliding it over to the lawyer. 

"What's this?" he asked, frowning at it, then picking it up to review it. 

"A copy of a page from your Aunt Jean's original will before you tried to alter it." Hanson pointed to a highlighted portion on the page. "Notice that clause that states your monthly stipends will cease upon her death or remarriage, whichever comes first. The fact that she had already remarried, knocked you outta the money pot, didn't it? You got together with your girlfriend, here, to figure out a way to get back in." 

"No. No. You got it all wrong," Lawrence replied, frowning. "Melissa, er, Ms. Enright, did work for me briefly as my secretary several months ago but that's all she was: my secretary. And the will was being changed but only in keeping with the wishes of my late Aunt Jean."

"You're saying you had nothing to do with planning to get that dangerous animal into your aunt's house and having it attack her and her new husband?" Hanson asked. 

"No, nothing. She'd decided that her son and daughter would not have to wait until their 30th birthdays to inherit their parts of the estate in case ... in case anything happened to her. She also wanted her husband, Grant, to receive a larger portion of the estate." He paused, still frowning, then cast a suspicious look at a silent Melissa sitting next to him. 

"How 'bout you?" Hanson asked her. "You quit after Andre's mother got married again to Winston. You and Andre plotted to get his inheritance sooner by eliminating his mother and stepfather." 

Melissa continued to avoid Lawrence's gaze filled with confusion. Hanson continued his questioning, switching gears. 

"Guess if your girlfriend isn't willing to finger you in all of this, you walk," he said dismissively. 

"She isn't and never was my girlfriend!" Lawrence angrily reiterated. 

Hanson appeared unmoved by his outburst. He took the paper from Lawrence and put it back in the folder and closed it. "You're sayin' you're okay with not gettin' another dime from your aunt's estate?" he asked. 

"I have a very lucrative law practice," he responded. 

"Can't say that I'm buyin' your claim of innocence," Hanson said but before Lawrence could say anything again, he turned his attention to Melissa. 

"Which one was it? Him or Andre or ... both? Because it looks like they're both gonna be free to live their lives on the outside while you take the fall for Murder One and attempted Murder. You really prepared to go up the river while they sail off into the sunset?" He cast a disparaging eye at Lawrence again. "But maybe not scot free. Once everything comes out in the trial, the New York State Bar Association might strip you of your right to practice law in this state." 

Melissa straightened up at that, squaring her shoulders. "Lawrence ... Mr. Dunbar had nothing to do with this," she said. "He's a good man and a good lawyer." 

"So you're sayin' it was just you and Andre, then," Hanson stated more than asked but still skeptical that the lawyer had not been involved. Maybe they'd enjoyed some kind of hinky three-way romance. He'd heard about those. Hinky. 

"I was involved with Andre but it was all just for show. He had nothing to do with any of this, either." 

Hanson maintained a skeptical eye on her. "All for show. Okay. Who, then? Who was your boyfriend and co-conspirator?" 

Melissa closed her eyes and heaved a deep sigh in and out. "It was Grant. Grant Winston." She opened her eyes to meet Hanson's frowning gaze. "It was all his idea. It almost worked." She released a mirthless laugh and added, "What can I say? I only pretended to be crazy in love with that goof, Andre, but ... I got a thing for older men." 

"And money," Hanson dryly reminded her. 

"Yeah. That, too," she admitted, sighing. 

Lawrence, appalled and disgusted at her admission of having helped his aunt's former chauffeur plan her demise, left his chair and walked over to a corner of the room, his hands shoved down in his pockets. Hanson pushed a yellow, blue-lined, legal pad and pencil over to Melissa and instructed her to "write it all down". He gathered up the folder and stood up. 

"You're free to go, Mr. Dunbar," he quietly told him. "And ... sorry about ... the way things worked out." Dunbar nodded, pausing only for a moment as he walked around the table and past Melissa. She kept her eyes cast downward and he left the room, Hanson close behind him. He joined Reece and Jo in the hallway outside the viewing room and they walked down the corridor together toward the bullpen. 

"Good work, you guys," Reece told them with a satisfied smile. "Grant Winston is being cuffed and read his rights as we speak and a guard being posted outside his hospital room. And you cracked the case without Henry's help," she noted. 

"Well ... not exactly," Jo said, her own satisfied smile working its way across her face. "Henry suggested that we might put the screws to Dunbar in front of Melissa. That it might work to get the truth out of her if she believed an innocent person was also going down for her crime." 

Reece fought against her jaw dropping. "Whatever gave him the idea that Grant Winston might have been involved? He came across as having genuinely cared for his late wife." 

"Well, he, um, called me earlier to let me know that his family emergency was taken care of and that he'd be in tomorrow," Jo told her. "While I filled him in on the case, he reminded me of that old adage 'the butler did it' and that it could also be applied to greedy chauffeurs who found themselves suddenly rich." 

(_"But he's old enough to be her father. As liberal-minded as I am about age differences --- " _

_"_ _Well, in my experience, Detective --- " _

_"C'mon, Henry, I can't see **you** robbing the cradle." _

_"_ _ Ah ... well ... " _

_" You have!" _

_"It's ... complicated." ) _

"Richer, if they were suddenly widowed," Hanson added, snapping Jo out of the memory. "Have to admit, I didn't wanna take that crazy cracker's advice but ... it worked. Somehow, he knows all the time, doesn't he? Kinda gets on your nerves." His two colleagues chuckled at his annoyance with the absent ME for having shared a hunch with them that had once again panned out. "I'm just sayin'! How does he know all this stuff and why is he right all the time?" 

"Most of the time," Jo corrected him. "Henry's far from perfect." 

"Yeah, well, you coulda fooled me," Hanson muttered. 


	6. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reece mulls over her short conversation with Jo about Henry and how his strange way of doing things usually impacted their cases both on and off the record. She decides to get his input on how she should word her report since he had been there with her. At least, part of the time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many apologies for this short and late addition. Finally got a new laptop after my old one died several weeks ago, and I simply couldn't do this on my phone like some others reportedly have. Started this 6th chapter on a tiny-screened tablet (YUCK!) but it wouldn't italicize the words. Anyway, thank you all (who are still interested) for your patience and continued support.
> 
> I do not own "Forever" 2014-2015 TV show or any of its characters.

_"Tell me, Detective," Reece began. "How many strange experiences have you had with Henry as your partner during investigations?"_   


_"He does have a tendency to do things his own way," Jo replied. "But in the end, we get our perp."_

vvvv 

Reece mulled over her short conversation with her detective, wishing she had pressed harder for more information. But no. Get answers from the source, she told herself. With that determination, she found herself ascending the stairs in Abe's Antiques shop up to the second-floor living quarters, a nervous Henry following behind her and a cautious-looking Abe pretending not to watch them from the kitchen. This was the first time she'd ever been there. She'd heard about it, of course, from some of the other detectives and unis in her squad who'd searched the place in 2014 when Henry had been a suspect in the subway crash case, and later, after Henry had killed his stalker, Clarke Walker. It gave her more the feeling of being in a library or museum than in a person's home. She sat down on the settee with her thoughts swirling around in her head and suddenly realized that Abe was setting a tea set down in front of her on the coffee table. 

"Uh, one sugar, no cream," she replied to his query. He dropped the sugar cube into her cup and handed it to her. "Thank you," she said but just held onto the cup as she made eye contact with Henry, who sat across from her in a straight back chair, appearing uncomfortable from her intense gaze. 

"You look as though you're recovering well from our recent car accident," he told her and offered a weak smile along with his sincere sentiments. 

She thanked him and took a sip of tea before setting the cup and saucer down on the coffee table. "You look remarkably well yourself," she said. "Which is the main reason I wanted to speak with you and why I felt it was best to do it here instead of in my office." 

"I see," Henry replied resignedly. "What is it you wish to know, Lieutenant?" He mentally ran down the checklist of lies that he had rehearsed with Abe, in anticipation of this conversation with her. 

"You appeared to be injured or in some physical distress after we'd taken those two young women into custody," she began. "When you appeared unresponsive, I made the decision to turn on my siren and zip you over to the nearest hospital." 

"I'll admit that I was a bit dazed after having shoved Melissa Enright out of the way of a bullet and we fell to the ground," he replied. "But merely dazed." 

Reece inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly. "Dazed," she repeated with an unblinking stare. She leaned back and crossed her arms. "I suppose the impact of the crash woke you up then. Where did you disappear to? Think carefully before you answer, Doctor," she warned him, an eyebrow arched.

Henry managed to remain calm even though his heart rate had increased a bit. No longer interested in his tea, he parked the cup and saucer on the coffee table, stiffening a bit before replying. Even though he was in his own home instead of in her office when she'd questioned his odd behavior before around Christmas time last year, he felt more trapped. Releasing a long-held breath, he replied, "I simply can't tell you, Lieutenant." At least that was the truth. He simply couldn't. 

She frowned, her gaze changing to concern. "You don't remember?" 

Henry opened his mouth slightly but exchanged a hopeful look with Abe, who formed a small O with his lips and raised his eyebrows. They both realized that this was an out that neither had considered. He could claim temporary amnesia. Not an uncommon occurrence after a bump on the head suffered during a car crash. "As I said, I simply can't tell you. How I wound up outside of the car, that is," he immediately clarified. "But when I came to myself, you were being extricated from the vehicle and placed in an ambulance." 

"Well, they must have known that you may have been injured, too," she pointed out. "No one treated you at the scene of the accident?" 

"It's quite possible that someone may have attempted to and I refused," he replied. While he hated the lies, he felt they were necessary. "In my temporarily confused state, I may have waived any treatment." He hunched his shoulders and let out a quick sigh. "At any rate, a good samaritan allowed me to use their phone to call Abe at the shop and he picked me up." That is, of course, after he'd emerged from the river. 

"Yeah, uh, he wanted me to take him over to the hospital to see about you," Abe chimed in, in an effort to help his father pad the lies. 

"But he seemed alright to you?" she asked Abe. 

"Oh, oh, y-yeah," Abe stammered in reply. "Just ... naturally, a little shaken up," he added with a nervous chuckle. 

"Oh, naturally," Reece said as she processed the information from them. "Well." She gave a quick laugh. "Guess that explains it all." She laughed again. "You can't imagine what I first thought had happened. Something really weird." 

"Oh? Like ... what?" Henry asked as his cheek muscles twitched into an uncertain grin.

"Like you disappearing into thin air!" Reece exclaimed. They joined her in laughter, hoping she didn't notice how mirthless their's was. "How weird is that?" she asked rhetorically. 

_'Closer to the truth than you think,'_ Abe inwardly smirked as he took a long swallow from his teacup, wishing something stronger was in it. 

"Me disappearing --- into thin air," Henry said with a chuckle and a jerky wave of his hand as Reece nodded, grinning. "Well, that just means that --- " 

" --- I was really out of it," Reece finished his sentence for him. Her grin softened into a smile while she shook her head. "So!" Both Abe and Henry jumped when she said that. They both leaped to their feet and watched her with quiet anxiety. "Let me get out of here with my strange thoughts and leave you two to your evening." 

Henry smiled, clasped his hands, and rubbed his palms together. He then motioned towards the stairs and followed her down and let her out of the shop. He smiled broader and dipped his head once deeply as she waved goodbye to him and drove off. He dropped his smile, dropped his shoulders, and shut his eyes as he turned around and let the air rush out through his puffed cheeks. He went back upstairs and found his son standing over the kitchen sink taking a swig from a bottle of brandy. Normally, Henry would have admonished him for drinking straight from the bottle. But this time, with their hands and knees still shaking from their visit with Henry's quasi superior, Henry dropped his chin onto his chest and reached out for the bottle. Abe took another quick swig and handed it to him. 

As Abe watched his father take a drink, he said, "If it were me, I'd call in sick tomorrow and for the rest of the week." 

"Well, you're not me," Henry told him. He let out a sigh and added, "But I'll do it anyway." 


	7. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reece reluctantly submits her fudged report. Henry calls out sick to get a breather for a few days and to allow Reece to cool down. But a new player enters the game (no, not Adam) with information that may threaten to expose Henry's secret anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, guys. Sorry for the long delay between postings and for the shortness of this one. Between computer crashings and inadequate substitutes and writer's block, this update took much longer than anticipated. Excuses, excuses, I know. But I still apologize. Hope you enjoy reading and are still following along. Thank you!
> 
> I do not own "Forever TV show 2014-2015" or any of its characters but I think about 'em every day.

_"Me disappearing --- into thin air," Henry said with a chuckle and a jerky wave of his hand as Reece nodded, grinning. "Well, that just means that --- " _

_" --- I was really out of it," Reece finished his sentence for him. "So! Let me get out of here with my strange thoughts and leave you two to your evening."_

vvvv 

The next morning, Henry called his boss at the OCME, Chief ME Lillian Riordan, to let her know that he wouldn't be in that day because of illness. 

("Not the usual for you to miss work, Dr. Morgan," CME Riordan noted. "So, if you say you're sick, you must be really sick.") 

"Oh, most definitely, I assure you," he replied. If not physically, certainly emotionally; and that was beginning to adversely affect him physically. 

("Take care and don't forget," she reminded him, "if you're out for more than three consecutive days, you'll need a return-to-work release from your doctor.")

"Of course," he replied, grimacing at the realization of that little annoying departmental requirement. "Three days." They ended the call and he shoved his hands down into his pockets as he joined Abe at the kitchen table. 

Abe eyed him up and down before stating, "That's cutting it pretty close but by that time, the Lieutenant's ride-along should be ended. She bought your story, you'll be able to go back to work and ... everything will be fine." 

"Don't think for a second that she 'bought' my story," Henry cautioned him. "Why is it that more and more I find myself pinched in by either today's technology or blasted rules and regulations?!" 

Abe sighed and replied, "Way of the world, now, Pops. Way of the world." He paused before advising his father to alert Jo, as well. "She'll be worried if you're suddenly a no-show. And, if you're lucky, she'll pop over with a bowl of chicken soup." Abe smiled and winked at him, fearless of the look of fatherly reproof returned to him.

vvvv 

In the 11th Precinct's bullpen, both Jo and Hanson breathed a collective sigh of relief. Not only would they be able to resume their normal duties without any 'surprises' from Henry, but their boss also wouldn't be there to witness any again. However, Reece had called them into her office to discuss the resolution of the Jean Winston murder case. 

"So, not only did a lowly chauffeur luck into marrying his rich lady boss," Hanson chuckled, "he masterminded a plot to kill her and drive off into the sunset with a hot, young babe." The deviousness of perps never ceased to amaze him. 

"He was also lucky enough to have survived the bite of that deadly animal," Reece noted. 

"Well, his luck ran out," Jo began, "when Henry suggested that Grant may have protected himself with a smallpox vaccination prior to allowing himself to be bitten." 

Reece shuddered at the thought."The things some people will do for money," she lamented. 

"His luck ran out when Henry got on the case," Hanson loudly announced. "I mean, we're good at what we do," he added, looking between Jo and Reece. "But sometimes it's as if he's actually lived through different historical time periods and seen and learned more than the average person his age." Hanson shook his head. "I don't know how he does all that but can't keep his clothes on near the river!" 

Hanson's words repeated in Jo's mind about Henry maybe having gained his extensive knowledge from previous lives or ... just one long one. She looked at Reece and could see that similar thoughts were running through her mind. Jo laughed to herself. None of that was possible, though. Right? 

Reece shook herself out of her thoughts. More strange thoughts. "However he does it," she began, "we're lucky to have him on our side. Time to get back to work," she added. 

The two detectives rose to leave but she asked Jo to remain. Jo sat back down, nodded to her partner as he left, and then she turned her attention back to her boss. Hanson closed the door and left the two women alone. Reece clasped her hands in front of her, meeting Jo's gaze of curiosity. 

"We both had similarly strange experiences with Dr. Morgan, haven't we?" Reece asked her. Jo fidgeted nervously, opening her mouth and closing it before responding. 

"If you mean that he acts strangely sometimes, yes," Jo replied. "But he's not alone," she added. and pointed out some oddities of others they worked with. "Dr. Mobley in the OCME, who insists upon wearing his mother's pink, fuzzy slippers during autopsies for 'luck'. Dr. Ginad, who never performs autopisies on the 13th of the month and prays before and after each autopsy. Dr. Schiller, who swears that her romping in a nudist camp has made her a better woman and a better medical professional." 

Reece grunted out a laugh. "Idiosyncrasies are one thing," she noted. "Everyone has them. But none of Henry's fellow pathologists have been involved with field work like he has. Has he ever done anything to make you think that he was ... unbalanced? Or like he has a death wish or something?" 

Yes, he had. It was as if the man had no sense of self-preservation at all. It pained Jo to think about some of the things he had done. Like when he'd ran after a murder suspect, never flinching or slowing down even while being peppered with bullets. Or knowing that a mix of sour milk and baking soda would help revive an OD'd suspect by causing him to regurgitate. Although Jo failed to reply, her silence and pained expression spoke volumes to Reece. 

"Okay," Reece said with great resignation. It was clear that Jo was going to be as unforthcoming as Henry had been. She realized that she could question the EMT's further but something told her that that might raise their suspicions about the enigmatic ME and she felt an odd sense of protectiveness growing within her. So she wasn't going to get any more help or information from Jo or Henry and she'd have to fudge her report. The situation could be worse, she told herself. IAB could be breathing down her neck instead of just eyeing her suspciously. Her job wasn't on the line. Everyone survived the car accident ... one person more than the other two. She heaved a sigh. "Okay," she repeated. "You've made your point." She managed a smile and quietly dismissed her reluctant detective.

It took her less than an hour to complete and submit her report that included what had happened during the takedown of the two young women in the park including the necessity for her to shoot Amelia Dunbar resulting in the accidental discharge of Dunbar's weapon. Then, during the ride back to the Precinct, she suspected that her temporary partner, Henry, may have been injured by the errant bullet or after having collided onto the ground with Missy Enright in an effort to shield her from Dunbar shooting her. That was the reason for her decision to turn on her lights and siren. She thought it best to get Henry to the nearest hospital. Although circumstances cast her in a favorable light since blame for the collision was placed squarely on the shoulders of the driver of the other car, she cringed at how incomplete her report wound up being. But she hoped that the gaps in it would be adequately filled in by her and Henry's individual claims of having been dazed. With a sigh and fighting against the sting of resentment at Henry, who she felt had forced her to take the path of a liar, she signed and submitted her report. 

"Me and my bright ideas," she berated herself. "Ride along with them. See firsthand how they operated during field investigations." She reluctantly admitted that she'd been more curious about how Henry operated in the field. Having always heard of his quirky ways of helping to put cases away, her curiosity had, naturally, gotten the better of her. "And curiosity killed the cat," she reminded herself out loud. But she suspected that not even that would kill Henry. At least, not permanently. 

vvvv 

Jo had left Reece's office and joined Hanson at his desk where he had begun taking the statement of a possible witness to a murder. She nodded a silent assurance to him that everything was fine after her private chat with their boss.

"This is my partner, Det. Jo Martinez," Hanson told him, motioning to Jo. "This is Marvin Epstein," he added. 

She nodded her acknowledgement to the long-haired, small-statured man in his late 20's. She was thankful for the distraction and anxious to move on to something unrelated to Henry. 

"Mr. Epstein was just starting to share some information with me," Hanson added. "Says he saw somebody drown a while back." 

"How much of a while back?" Jo asked, intensifying her gaze at the young man. 

The man shrugged slightly. "A year .. maybe longer."

"I don't understand," Jo began, confused. "If you saw someone accidentally drown a year ago --- " 

"Oh, it didn't look like it was accidental," Epstein quickly piped up, interrupting her. "It, it looked like ... like it was intentional." 

Jo and Hanson frowned at each other and then back at him. "Wouldn't that make it suicide, then?" Jo asked. 

"Mmm, maybe. If it was, it looked like the guy quickly changed his mind," Epstein replied. 

"So, it was a guy," Hanson said. 

"Yeah, but it was a totally weird way to kill yourself," Epstein said, frowning deeply. "See, I film street scenes at different times of the day and night and sell them. They've been used in TV shows, movies, commercials, like that." He crossed his arms and sat back, smiling. "Maybe you remember my most famous work. The opening scenes for the TV show, "Snooze", where a crowd of people are milling around in Times Square." When met with their blank stares of non-recognition, he sighed and uncrossed his arms. "It only lasted eight episodes. Apparently, it made what few viewers it had 'snooze', too." 

"Let's get back to the guy, the drowning victim," Hanson urged him. 

"I, I just got the tail end of his ride on tape," he said. "He was in the back seat of a cab that plunged into the Hudson River off Pier 40." 

The two detectives froze momentarily as they clearly recalled Hanson having said almost those same words after being notified that Harbor Patrol had recovered the waterlogged cab of murdered cabbie, Raj Patel. They also recalled that only moments prior to that, Henry had proposed that the cab might "no longer be on Manhattan".

Hanson broke his gaze of uncertainty with Jo and pushed a yellow legal pad and a pencil at Epstein. "Write down everything," he instructed him. While Epstein wrote, he and Jo walked over to her desk to discuss the possibility of reopening a closed case that may involve their enigmatic ME. Jo wondered if they should talk to Henry. Inwardly, she hoped it wouldn't come to that even though she had had her own suspicions about the night he'd gotten into the cab to go home but not too long after had somehow wound up naked in the East River. Maybe he hadn't simply dropped his pocket watch in the back of the recovered cab, she thought. Maybe those scratch marks left by someone desperate to get out of the back of the cab ... were his. She shuddered at the implications of Epstein's disturbing statements. The detective part of her wanted answers about this from Henry but another part of her resolved to protect him from any undue scrutiny. Something told her that he'd suffered enough. Just how much, though, and for what reason, she didn't know. 

"I say we look at the tape first," Hanson was saying. 

"Um, yeah, that makes sense," she replied, shaking herself out of her thoughts. "No need to bother Henry unless it's necessary." 

"Henry?" he asked, surprised. "Who said anything about bothering the Doc? He's at home with a bug, leave him be." 

"Yeah, yeah, you're right," she chuckled nervously, realizing that she and her partner were not (thankfully) on the same wavelength. "It's just that he always has some kooky take on things," she said in an effort to hide her real reasons for thinking this involved him. 

"I know but we can handle this kook ourselves," he replied, glancing over at Epstein, who appeared to be finished writing his statement. "Let's look over his statement and see if we really need to break out the popcorn and dim the lights," he quipped.

vvvvvvvv 

Slight references to "Skinny Dipper" S01/E11; "King of Columbus Circle" S01/E15; and "New York Kids" S01/E07


	8. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 8

Just as Jo and Hanson had decided (Jo, more reluctantly than he) to view the tape in question that Marvin Epstein claimed showed someone drowning while in the back of a cab, Lucas entered the bullpen with a slightly anxious and questioning look on his face. When he spotted Epstein, a fellow short-film enthusiast, sitting at Hanson's desk, he quickly loped over to him. 

"Hey, Lucas," Epstein greeted him. 

"Hey, Marv," Lucas replied as he laid a manila folder with a report in it on Hanson's desk. "What, uh, what are you doing here?" 

"My civic duty," he replied. "Think I caught maybe a murder on one of my street crowd tapes. My duty to report it, right?" 

"Wow," Lucas marveled. "Well, you came to the right place. My two colleagues here are two of the best. They'll figure it out," he added, grinning.

Jo wondered if Lucas would be so enthusiastic if he knew that it might also involve something strange about his boss, the Big Guy. She laughingly realized that given how much the young man reveled in things out of the ordinary, he would embrace the situation with open arms.Hanson took the disc from Epstein that he'd downloaded the incident onto and thanked him, informing him that they would update him as soon as possible. 

vvvv 

Thankfully, Epstein had isolated the short segment of the taxi going out of control and plunging off of Pier 40 and into the Hudson, saving the detectives from the exhaustive viewing hours they'd imagined. And although Jo remained apprehensive about what the tape might reveal, she was relieved that Hanson appeared to approach their viewing task with a double grain of salt. That is until Reece entered the conference room and wordlessly took a seat on the other side of the long table. Hanson inserted the disc into the slot in the TV and started it. He stepped back and seated himself in front of Jo across from Reece. 

The image of the yellow taxi blurred and cleared intermittently as it careened into view and with a violent upward lurch, plunged into the water and quickly sank. The speed at which the vehicle dropped below the waves astonished them. But not as much as seeing the image of a man in the back seat flailing his arms and pounding futilely on the clear, plastic privacy panel separating the front and back seats.As the taxi sank, the man's dark hair could be seen as he continued to struggle in a drastic attempt to free himself. Once it completely sank and the waters slowly calmed, the tape ended. Each of them jotted down the date and time stamp of December 18, 2014 and 6:37:22 PM. 

"Well, now we know how and when Patel's taxi cab wound up in the water," Reece somberly stated. "No bodies were found inside or nearby back then?" she asked. 

"No, no bodies," Hanson quietly replied. "I can't imagine how either the passenger or the driver got out, though." He paused for a moment before adding, "And there was no blood found inside. That window was shot out from inside the cab. Why no blood?" He turned his head slightly and spoke over his shoulder to Jo. "Those scratches on the door panel in the back seat were left by the passenger desperate to get out," he said. "Guess he made it," he added with a shrug.

"Likewise, whoever was driving made it out, too," Reece noted. "The force of the water must have closed the doors back," she speculated. Another thought entered her mind that she chose not to share. She hadn't seen a driver behind the wheel and it appeared to shift back and forth erratically as if unguided. A driverless cab with a frantic passenger struggling to get out in the back seat, she mulled. A frantic passenger with dark hair whose face was obscured by the alternating blurriness and the street lights. She had to stop herself from asking Jo what time Henry had boarded his cab outside the precinct that same night. Her normal inquisitiveness was recently being sharply curtailed, she realized, when it came to their mysterious ME. She resolved to question her detective when they were alone. This need to know was gnawing at her psyche. She simply had to get some answers that made sense but was becoming more and more afraid that the answers would not. 

"Whaddaya think, partner?" Hanson asked Jo. "Strange doings, huh?" 

"Um, yeah, strange," she managed. She took in a breath and released it. "Looks more like an accident that ... most likely ended okay for both of them. No blood was found because of all the water having washed it away and ... there's no way to accurately identify the passenger because his features are so obscured." That was a flat out lie. She totally recognized the shape of that dark-haired man's head and the scarf around his neck that had quickly glinted in and out of view. She was embarrassed to admit that more and more often, many aspects of his handsome frame had begun to play over in her mind cutting into her sleep. 

"And, according to Henry, the Hudson's natural current would have allowed the bodies, if there were any, to possibly pool in that same spot " Jo and Hanson looked over at her curiously. She chuckled softly. "When he and his roommate, Abe, had gotten into trouble while searching for that dagger in that spot back then, he explained about the currents and how the debris from a 1904 steamboat disaster had pooled there."

Hanson chuckled and shook his head. "That's the Doc --- a walking history book." He looked at Reece again. "Your call, Lieu. We pursue this as a possible homicide or suicide? Prank gone wrong?" 

"No," she replied and rose from her seat. "Thank Mr. Epstein for his time but explain to him the reasons why we won't pursue any investigation into this incident." It felt oddly good to say that but at the same time she knew that her own private investigation just jumpstarted and kicked into high gear. "Detective Martinez. My office for a moment," she told Jo. 

Hanson removed the disc and turned around to face both of them. "Hey. This is the second time this has happened. Anything I need to know?" he asked. 

Both women quickly responded in unison: "No!" 

Eyeing them suspiciously, he said, "O-kayyy." Then he squinted and asked, "This a, uh, 'she' thing?" as he wiggled a finger back and forth between them. 

"Don't worry, Mike," Reece replied, smiling. "If we need your input on female sanitary products, we'll be sure to include you." 

"Uh ... no," he replied, clearly a bit shaken. "I definitely do not need to know about that stuff!" He quickly left the conference room and headed back to his desk to phone Epstein. 

Jo swallowed her laughter and followed her amused boss out of the room and into her office. Once inside, Reece stepped back and waited for Jo to close the door. Instead of seating themelves, she got right to the point. "It looked like Dr. Morgan in the back seat of that cab." 

Jo was slightly stunned by her bluntness. "We ... can't assume that," she replied. "It could have been anybody." Her heart was racing. Although her thoughts seemed to be falling in line with those of Reece's, she had not had the courage to voice them for they were so incredible; so unbelievable. Henry had survived the drowning but ... how? 

Reece turned and walked over to her desk. "I have proof that it was him." She retrieved a file folder from her top drawer and opened it before handing it to Jo. "He was arrested that same night for swimming nude in the East River. Note the time." 

Jo's trembling hands reached for the folder and as she held it and read the time of the arrest report, her eyes widened. She gulped and shoved it back at Reece as if it were contagious. 

Reece took the folder and closed it. She nodded and said, "There is no way he could have made it from the location of the cab's sinking and over to the spot where he was arrested unless he flew!" 

"It, it, it ... I mean he, um ... " Jo stammered nervously. "It simply could not have been him in the cab!" 

"Let's say that that's true," Reece offered. "Why was he at first so anxious to get to his home so his roommate wouldn't worry about him and then strip and dive in the river?!" 

"Idiosyncrasies," Jo defiantly replied. "You said it yourself; everyone has them. He got an urge, he's stressed out --- " 

"Detective --- " 

"I don't know!" Jo yelled. Frustrated at losing control of her emotions, she crossed her arms and bit her lower lip. "Henry is weird," she continued in a lower but trembling voice. "That's all. There is nothing supernatural about him!" 

"He disappeared while in my car almost at the time of impact," Reece confessed. It felt suddenly freeing to tell someone, to voice it out loud, the strange occurrence she'd recently witnessed. 

"Disap --- ?" Jo stopped herself from saying the word and shook her head, turning away from Reece and her insistence on relating the strange events revolving around Henry and that Jo must have witnessed something similar while working with him. "No! No! That just sounds crazy!" she said, swiping her hand away from her. 

"But I am not crazy," Reece replied, raising her voice, as well. "At first, I tried to explain it away. But the reason that he was not attended to by any of the EMT's is because he simply was no longer on the scene." 

"He was perfectly fine the next day," Jo countered. "Not a mark on him although --- " The rest of her words stuck in her throat as she suddenly recalled through her haze after having been shot by the mass murderer, Koehler, she could have sworn that she'd seen Henry and him fall off of the roof of Grand Central on their first case. He was perfectly fine the next day back then, too, when he should have been ... dead. 

"You have witnessed something similar while out in the field with him," Reece whispered. 

"Why are you pressing this point?" Jo asked, irritated. "Do you want to arrest him for being ... I don't know, strange? There's no law against a person being strange or weird." 

"Or being the creepiest person you've ever met?" Reece asked, mimicking Jo's own words after first meeting the mysterious man in 2014. Jo sighed and closed her eyes, dropping her shoulders. "You're right, Jo," Reece continued, her voice softened. "I just need to convince myself that I am not crazy. Henry is simply harboring a very, very strange secret." 

Jo blinked and shook her head in wonder and near disbelief over the implications of their conversation. Their secretive ME, the man whose hot handsomeness had begun to frequent both her daydreams and night dreams somehow had the power to vanish whenever threatened and pop up miles away unharmed. It sounded absurd, unbelievable but ... there was no other explanation for it. "What do you suggest we do?" 

"He's a friend of ours, as well as a colleague," Reece began. "If you had an incredible secret that might ... frighten others, you'd naturally be reluctant to share it, too." Jo sighed and nodded. "Maybe ... maybe we could just let him know that whatever it is --- he doesn't have to share it with us --- but whatever it is, he doesn't have to fear losing our friendship and support." Jo nodded again as she continued. "People who are hiding things usually up and leave, never to be heard from again. We want him to understand that he doesn't have to run from us." 

A visibly more relaxed Jo smiled slightly and said, "I'll bet anything that Abe knows. What a weight to bear being probably the only person alive who helps keep your secret." 

"Well, the sooner we let them know that they're not alone anymore, the better, don't you think?" Reece asked as she smiled and patted her on the arm. 

Jo smiled broader. "Just the two of us for now?" she asked, thinking of Hanson and Lucas. 

"Let's not overwhelm the poor man," Reece cautioned.


	9. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 9 Tell Him

Hanson hung up the phone just as Jo walked back to her desk and sat down with a stifled sigh. The obvious tenseness in her shoulders told him that she had discussed something much more significant than what their boss had alluded to. "Everything ... taken care of?" he hesitantly asked. 

"Wha--- ? Oh. Yeah," she replied, catching herself. She then noticed a paper cup of coffee and two packets of sugar on her desk. She smiled a thank you to Hanson and removed the lid to add the sugar. As she stirred the brew, she pretended not to notice his fixed gaze on her. "You call Epstein?" she asked, genuinely interested.

"Yeah," he replied. "He's a lot like his buddy, Lucas," he added, shaking his head. "Was disappointed to find out we aren't gonna investigate what he thought might produce a dead body somewhere. Kid's really into his monster movies and crime dramas."

"Sounds like one of Lucas' friends," she wryly remarked. Henry and his possible impossible secret fleeted across her mind, wiping her slight grin off her face, which didn't go unnoticed by Hanson. He left his desk and stood by hers. 

"Look, Jo," he began. "You and Lieu seemed at first like you were disagreeing about something." 

Of course, she told herself. He may not have heard what they were saying but the office's glass enclosure hid very little from outside observers. Before she could reply, he continued. 

"And don't think for one second that I bought that crap about --- you know!" he warned her. "It was about the Doc, right? He in trouble?" 

At that, her nervous hand knocked against the side of the coffee cup jostling the hot, syrupy liquid onto her hand and down onto her desk. She quickly began to clean up the spill. 

"Guess I was right," he concluded, staring more intently at her.

vvvv 

Abe's Antiques a little after 4:00 that afternoon ... 

Abe, who had just returned from getting a haircut at the barber shop next door on Stanton Street, was met with a locked door and the sign flipped to Closed. He released a quick sigh of frustration and fished his keys out of his pocket. Once inside, he hesitated before locking the door back and leaving the sign as it was. He mentally geared himself up for another pep talk with his very old but young-looking and sometimes childish-acting father.

"No, Dad," he told him when he found him in the living area on the second floor.. "You're not gonna go back into hiding again."

Henry met him with a slight frown. "I hadn't planned to," he replied, then looked away from him. "Yet," he quietly added.

"Yeah," Abe drew out. He sat down next to him on the small couch. "What's on your mind?"

"It's just that ... I can't shake the feeling that ... the walls are beginning to close in on me," Henry haltingly confessed.

"Walls in the form of one highly perceptive lady cop?" Abe cautiously asked. His father knew he was referring to the Lieutenant.

Henry scoffed. "Not just one but two very perceptive lady cops."

"Jo," Abe stated. His father pursed his lips and nodded. "Well, I don't think you have much to worry about, Pops." 

Henry couldn't believe his ears. Of course, he had to worry! He jumped up and paced away from Abe then turned around to face him. "Any day, any moment, I expect either or both of them to come here and confront me," he told his son. "They both have been confused over some of my actions or words and they have questions for me." 

"Instead of feeling discouraged, you should be encouraged by the fact that neither of them have turned you in, so to speak," Abe said. "Jo has been covering for you for quite a while. Even though it's only been a few days since the Lieutenant's become suspicious of you, she hasn't turned you over to anybody, either," Abe pointed out. 

Henry, still frowning and wringing his hands, retook his seat next to Abe. He unclasped his hands and rested them on his thighs as he sat back. "They're getting ready to converge on me, Abe," he told him. "I just feel it. If not today, then soon," he predicted.

They were both startled at the sound of knocking on the shop's glass entrance door. Abe left his seat and walked to the top of the stairs, venturing down a few steps to peer at who was knocking. He straightened up, looked at his father over his shoulder and announced, "Guess it's today." 

The knocking persisted and Henry stood up. Abe offered to tell the two women that he was not home but Henry raised his hand and lowered his head. "It's all right, Abraham. Let them in." 

vvvv 

In the morgue, Lucas munched on a bag of sour cream chips and washed it down with a grape soda as he read his newest graphic novel. At the first ring of his desk phone, he answered it. On the other end of the line was his filmmaker buddy, Marv Epstein, upset over the NYPD choosing not to investigate his bit of film footage as a homicide or suicide. Lucas did his best to soothe his friend's ruffled feathers by explaining to him that the two detectives he'd recently interacted with had shared his concerns with their boss and she had rendered the final verdict not to investigate further.

"They said because it was impossible to tell who the person was in the back of the cab," Marv told Lucas. "I didn't bother to 'clean it up' before giving it to them to view because I was sure they'd pass it to their techies to do that," he clarified. "Which they didn't," he added, disgruntled. "But you're better at that than I am," he said with hope in his voice. 

Lucas shook his head even though Marv couldn't see it. "Normally, Marv, I'd jump on it but --- " 

"But these are your friends, huh?" Marv said, interrupting him. "You've known me longer!" Lucas' sigh was heard. "Look at it this way," Marv offered. "You'd actually be helping them, too, by cleaning up those images. Somebody went into the water while they were trapped in the back of that cab. Find out who the passenger was, you find out if they're really okay or not." He waited as Lucas remained silent on the other end and then reluctantly agreed to help him. A wide grin spread over Marv's face. "All of this is probably working toward being the bones of the best short film you and I have ever put together!" 

Lucas wasn't quite sure. He felt his loyalty torn between his two sets of friends. But who knows, he asked himself. Maybe someone had been harmed that night. Maybe they were okay. He sighed again. "Okay, okay, you win. Drop the disc off to me at the food truck outside the precinct at 3:30," he told him. 

"Thanks, Bro! You won't regret it," Marv excitedly told him and hung up.

vvvv 

Lucas's apartment shortly after 5:00 that same afternoon ... 

He'd been admittedly more excited than he'd expected to be after Marv dropped off the disc to him; so, unable to contain his growing curiosity, he'd offered some excuse about having an upset stomach and left work early. Thankfully, things were kind of slow so he didn't have to feel too guilty over the little white lie. Anyway, after shirking off his jacket and shoes, he settled in front of his trusty computer and placed the disc into the slot. He took a swig from his bottle of beer as the computer read it and slowly loaded the short clip. As he watched the images progress --- if one could call it that --- he quickly became aware of why Reece had decided not to pursue an investigation. He shook his head, grinning, for he felt he knew exactly what to do to make the images pop a little clearer. He quickly uploaded the clip to his favorite photoshop program and waited.

A few minutes and a few clicks here and there soon removed the blurring. It took a little more than 30 minutes to soften the glares from the street lights and headlights. As an added assurance, he brightened the entire clip so that it appeared more to have occurred during daylight hours than at night. He chuckled to himself at the sight of the scarf the trapped passenger wore, thinking that someone else had similar fashion tastes as his always dapperly dressed boss. Satisfied, he settled back to review the final product now displaying clearer images. He raised his bottle of beer to his lips and froze at the sight of a very familiar face struggling in the back seat of the doomed cab. Lucas couldn't believe his eyes as he watched a man strongly resembling his boss, Henry, fight to free himself from the cab even after it plunged into the Hudson.

That coat. The scarf. That thatch of dark, curly hair, that scruff. Those eyes! All Henry! Lucas swallowed when the short clip ended and rewound automatically. Again, he watched and he froze the screen more than once at different intervals. At the point just before the cab lurched up and off of the roadway, he froze and enlarged the image of the man's face. 

"Henry," he whispered. He leaned back and covered his mouth with one hand and only then realized that his hand, hands, were trembling. "What happened, Big Guy?" he asked out loud, physically pained at the sight of him struggling and disappearing below the waters as the cab sank. "How'd you escape from the cab?" 

Then, he recalled that the mysterious ME had also been arrested that same night for taking a naked swim in the East River. "H-how'd you get from here (the Hudson) to way over there?" he asked the unresponsive image on the computer's monitor. "How was that even possible since --- " 

Lucas swallowed again as he recalled seeing Henry walk out of the precinct with Jo that night close to 6:30. He knew from Jo that Henry had gotten into a cab --- the cab in the video clip that had gone into the water only minutes after. "No! Way!" he exclaimed. No way that Henry could have escaped the cab from underwater, swam miles away to perform a striptease, and get himself arrested only minutes later. No way. 

Lucas blinked at the improbable set of facts presenting themselves one after the other to him and realized that he really did have an upset stomach now. This was making him feel so sick. But he also knew that he couldn't let anyone else see this. Not ever. Not Jo or Hanson or Reece. Especially not Reece. And for sure, not Henry. "Damn, Henry," he whispered. "What the hell is going on with you?" 


	10. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 10 It's OK Henry

_"They're getting ready to converge on me," Henry told Abe. "If not today, then soon," he predicted._

_Knocking on the shop's glass entrance door prompted Abe to first investigate who was knocking. "Guess it's today," Abe said. He offered to tell their visitors, Jo and Reece, that he was not home._

_Henry raised his hand and lowered his head. "It's all right, Abraham. Let them in." _

vvvv 

The muffled voices of Abe greeting Jo and Reece caused Henry's heart to race. They really were here and much sooner than he'd thought. Much sooner than he wished. He fought to calm himself as he heard them coming up the stairs._ 'Best to get it over with,'_ he told himself. He smiled politely at them as they slowly approached him. 

"Ladies," he began, displaying his widest grin. "How nice to see you both." He directed them to seat themselves on the couch and for Abe to bring them all something to drink. His back was to them as he watched Abe go into the kitchen to prepare a pot of tea. Although he knew it wasn't good manners to remain turned away from company, he found himself fast becoming rooted to the spot. 

"Um .. Henry?" 

Jo's voice helped compel him to turn and face them. "What is it you wish to know, ladies?" 

The two women looked at each other then back at him. They could see the anxiety in his eyes mixed with resignation and defiance. No. Resolve. They could only imagine that he may have been in this position before and that he was determined to get through it as best he could. Jo couldn't help but recall the look in his eyes when she had confronted him with that old black-and-white photo of a beaming couple with their infant son. At that time, Henry had looked more frightened but somewhat relieved. Although his explanation that the man in the photo was his grandfather, it had not been convincing enough for her. They had almost immediately had another case drop on them and in the months following, he had chosen not to offer any further explanations about the photo. She had, therefore, chosen to wait until he was willing to tell her the truth.

And so they'd come to this moment. He looked strangely, hopefully, more willing to answer their questions. Jo wryly wondered if it was because of her boss' more authoritative presence. Maybe, she thought, she should have brought Reece with her back then when she'd confronted him with the photo. Reece wished that they had planned this meeting a little better. Jo, however, felt oddly encouraged at his seeming willingness to cooperate. She left her seat and went to stand in front of him. 

"It's not so much that, Henry," she told him. After a slight pause, she admitted, "Well, it sort of is, but ... " 

Reece now stood slightly behind Jo. "It's more that we want you to know that whatever problem you're having, whatever it is that you feel the need to ... keep hidden from everyone except your roommate," she began. 

"We've got your back," Jo finished for her. "A-and if you want to talk ... to either one of us about it, whatever it is --- "

"You can," Reece assured him, finishing Jo's thought. The two woman smiled briefly at each other, realizing that maybe they were more properly prepared than they thought. Henry wasn't running away; he looked slightly more relaxed than he had at first. This appeared to be going well. Reece took in another breath and released it. "But if you never want to talk about it, we understand and accept that," she told him. "We ask just one thing." 

Henry waited expectantly, hardly breathing. Hardly believing what he was hearing. They weren't going to demand any answers? Just ... wanted to reassure him that they would support him no matter what? Why, he could be a murderer, a fugitive from justice, an international jewel thief! Was he really going to get off that easily? 

"We want you to stop taking chances with your life, Henry," Jo told him. "We're all a team and we care about each other." 

"You promise to stop jumping in front of bullets and making yourself a target for muscle-bound strong men," Reece began, "or you're relegated back to the morgue." 

Jo took his hand and squeezed it. "And one day if you want to talk, really talk ... we're here." 

A smile worked its way slowly across his face. This was going to be easier than he thought. Merely promise to "behave" from now on, let them as law enforcement officers take the risks in future field investigations and he was off the hook to divulge any of his secrets? He studied both women then looked over his shoulder at his son, who was standing with one hand resting on the kitchen island and his other on his hip. Abe's look implied that he would support any decision he chose to make but he'd also made it clear that he thought his father should just come clean with them. Henry sighed, accepting his fate, and motioned for both women to retake their seats, which they did. 

"As much as I appreciate everything you've both said," he started, "it wouldn't be fair for either of you to leave without knowing the truth." He waited as Abe brought in the tea service and set it down on the small table near the couch. While Abe served them, Henry continued. "There's much to tell. And it could take some time," he warned them. 

"We're all ears," Reece replied with a smile. 

"Are you sure, Henry?" Jo asked, concerned. 

"No," he quickly admitted and just as quickly added, "I never am when it comes to others learning about ... my condition." 

Condition? That meant he was ill in some kind of way, physically or mentally. Physically, he looked fine except for that strange scar tissue on his chest. Okay, mentally. He has a death wish for some reason. Maybe this intervention could serve to help rid him of it. 

"I'll be in my room if you need me," Abe said and turned to leave. 

"Well, seeing as how you're a big part of my long story," Henry told him, "I'd very much like for you to remain." Abe smiled and nodded. The two men brought in a chair from the kitchen table and seated themselves facing the women. Henry managed a more genuine and relaxed smile as he gazed into Jo's eyes. "Let's start with that old family photo, shall we?" 

Reece frowned, slightly confused. "Family photo?" 

"Oh, you're gonna love this," Abe assured her teasingly. 

Jo settled back with a satisfied smile as she maintained her gaze at Henry. "I can't wait."

vvvvvvvv 

Sorry for the shortness of this chapter but I wanted to get this posted while I get over my latest bout of writer's block. Thank you all for your patience and continued interest.

Wash hands often, stay safe and healthy.


	11. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 11 Coming Clean

Abe, seated on his father's left, leaned slightly over to him and cast an occasional look of concern mixed with pride at him while he unravelled his long story to the two women. Occasionally, he studied their reactions as when Henry revealed that Abe was the baby in the photo. 

"Okay," Jo said. "Is this your mother, Sylvia Blake, holding you, Abe?" 

"Yeah, that's Mom," Abe replied with a smile of remembrance of her even though she'd identified his mother by her false identity. This was the time for Dad to straighten all of that out, he told himself. 

"And ... the man standing next to them?" Reece asked, almost accusingly. When Henry quietly replied that it was him, she momentarily paused to take that in before asking how that was even possible.

"Because they are my wife and child," Henry admitted. "Even though that picture was snapped in 1945 I can assure you it is I for I am ... much older than you think." 

Reece gazed in wonder at the small photo in her hand. "Well, I'll be," she whispered. "Sylvia Blake." And he's much older than he looks. That would mean --- 

Something didn't sit quite right with Jo as she recalled Henry having told her during the Gloria Carlysle case that his wife's name was Abigail. 

Abe, realizing that Reece was still working with the misinformation they'd previously provided to her, sat up a little straighter and briefly eyed his father, whose smile had flattened. Both of them also realized that Jo might be a little confused, thinking that Sylvia and Abigail were two different women.

"Actually --- she was Abigail," Henry reluctantly replied. His eyes locked with Jo's, an apologetic half-smile on his face. Turning his attention to Reece, he clarified, "Sylvia Blake was one of the aliases she'd used after she'd left me." Reece solemnly formed a silent O with her lips and lowered her eyes to the photo. 

"Okay. Okay," Jo said, bobbing her head up and down, her eyes darting here and there. "So --- Abe is your --- son." 

Reece snatched her head up and looked at Abe in wonder. "You, you, you're --- ?" 

"His son," Abe replied to her unfinished question with a smile and the fingers of one hand spread over his chest. 

Henry slowly leaned over to Abe and placed his hand on his shoulder. "Adopted," he clarified as he smiled warmly at Abe and then at them. "But my beloved son, nonetheless." 

Jo smiled and shook her head then chuckled. "Why didn't I see that?" Then, "But, of course, he is!" She grinned at Abe as if seeing him for the first time, understanding their relationship unsecreted for the first time. 

Reece slapped her thigh as she held the photo in her other hand. "The damndest thing!" she exclaimed. "Please continue, Doctor," she urged him.

For more than two hours, Henry revealed more to them regarding his mortal life before and his extended life after that fateful night in 1814 aboard the Empress of Africa slaveship. They listened raptly as he told of his first death after being shot in the chest by the ship's captain and the humbling, naked rebirths in water after each death. 

"Oh, my God," Reece murmured, as she recalled the grilling she'd given Henry in her office after one of his arrests for what everyone had thought was skinny dipping. "Doctor, I am so sorry," she said as she lowered her hand from over her mouth. "I never would have spoken to you like that, treated you like that if I'd known." 

"Lieutenant," Henry began, "don't be too hard on yourself." He paused, pursing his lips before continuing. "It has been my sad experience in the past whenever my condition was revealed that much harsher treatment was dealt to me. I simply couldn't chance it by being truthful with you at that time." 

Jo tilted her head with a slight smile. "That's why you know so much about ... so much," she chuckled. "Born in 1779, you've lived so long, seen so much --- "

" --- picked up I don't know how many languages," Reece added. 

"And that's why he comes off as kind of a stuff shirt sometimes," Abe joined in. When his father appeared to take exception to his statement, Abe said, "Oh, c'mon, Pops, you know you do with all those 18th-century gentlemanly ways. It's a wonder you haven't been found out long before now." 

Henry crossed his arms and raised his eyes to the ceiling. He huffed out a sigh and said, "I do not apologize for having been raised to be a gentleman, Abraham." He lowered his eyes and looked at the two women. "Apparently, even that was not enough to prepare me for the grueling tasks of fatherhood." 

Abe feigned hurt feelings as the women chuckled and marveled at the flip-flopped father and son's banter. "Aw, Pops, you were and are a great father. Which is why I am such a great kid and I know how proud you are of me." 

Henry's attempt at a frown failed as as a grin widened across his face and the women chuckled more.

vvvvvvvv

NOTES: 

Another short chapter, I know. But my brain/thought process is currently divided between this and another fic, "A Masamune Mystery". Not a good excuse but it's the truth. :( Anyway, I am earnestly working to churn out the next chapter and for it to be longer. 

Thank you all for your patience and continued interest. Wash hands often, stay safe and healthy.


	12. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Henry, with the help of Abe, has come clean about his immortality with Jo and Reece. For the moment, the four of them think that exposure of his secret has gone no further than with the four of them. Across town, though, another colleague has had his own suspicions about the ME confirmed to a certain extent. Will he (Lucas) act on his suspicions?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I do not own "Forever" 2014 -2015TV show or any of its characters. Maybe Hallmark Channel would like to.

Having watched several times the short video clip of a man, apparently Henry, who'd struggled in the back of a cab that had sank in the Hudson off of Pier 40, Lucas now found himself guzzling his third bottle of beer in a bar down the street from his apartment. The bar, Rick's, was not as nice as McSorley's but he had needed to get out of his apartment real quick and mingle with people who \--- he wasn't quite sure how to express it \--- people who were real and lived normal lives a normal way. Not like \---

_'Damn! What do I do with this information?'_ he silently lamented. But as he thought more and more about it, it wasn't exactly horrible. Henry, his boss, the morgue's own man of mystery who possessed knowledge on most any subject, was a ... a ... what? What was he? Even though he couldn't confidently assign a definite descriptor to the strange ME, he couldn't deny the excitement building inside him about it. Then he recalled Det. Hanson having grumbled earlier that day that something was "up" with Henry and that Reece and Jo had a pretty good idea of what it was. A familiar voice broke into his thoughts and he looked to his right to see his friend, Marv, seating himself next to him at the bar. 

"You were supposed to call me," he pointedly reminded him. "When you didn't answer your door, I figured you'd be here," he added and ordered a mug of beer. "Were you able to clean up that video clip?" he asked. 

Lucas averted his eyes and said, "No." He took another swig of his beer while Marv eyed him in disbelief. 

"Oh, c'mon, you're the best!" Marv said, patting him on the shoulder. "Nothing?" he asked, sticking his neck out as he raised his eyebrows.

Lucas shook his head and swigged down the rest of his beer. Although Marv was a longtime friend since their college days and he barely knew Henry, he strongly believed that keeping his mouth shut about what he'd found on the video clip was more important. Important for \--- protecting Henry. He didn't really know why or from what but that he needed to be protected.

"Dude, you look freaked out about something," Marv told him. "What up?” 

And, sadly, he realized that in this instance, he had to lie to his friend Marv. “N-nothing,” he stammered his reply. “Well … I kind of … broke it. I-it’s broken. Sorry,” he said, frowning his best apology to his friend. “Stepped on it getting out of the shower.” Now, that was just lame, he admonished himself. Lame, lame, lame! What’s worse, Marv wasn’t buying it by the look on his face. 

“You showered and put the same clothes back on?” Marv asked as his eyes roamed up and down Lucas’ long frame. 

_ ‘Oh, SNAP!’ _

Marv, clearly annoyed, quickly stood up from his seat. “Look, I don’t know what’s going on with you and your cop friends, not wanting to help me out at all with that footage but — “ His features smoothed out and his mouth formed an O, his eyes widening. “Unless … they really are investigating what happened to that guy in the back of the cab and it’s all top secret, right?” 

The look of excited wonder on his face made Lucas feel more guilty than ever but not having any luck convincing him otherwise, he eventually relented. “Yeah, yeah,” he reluctantly agreed, “it’s a secret. Top secret. You can’t tell a soul or let them know you’re on to them.” 

“Oh, sure, sure,” Marv replied breathlessly, nervously shifting his eyes and feet from side to side. “Imagine my footage, that little bitty clip, helpin’ to nail a perp.” He grabbed both of Lucas’s broad shoulders. “Maybe a serial killer, huh?” 

“Marv, I, I really don’t know,” Lucas moaned. 

“Right, right,” Marv interrupted. “Can’t blow the case.” He looked jerkily around at the other patrons and declared, “Could be anybody. Anybody in here, even.” He dropped his hands and straightened his 5’6” frame to as tall as he could. “Got it. My lips are sealed.” He finished his beer and paid for it. “Guess I’ll go on home and let you and your friends break the case.” He left but then scooted back over to Lucas. “This. Totally. Blows my mind!” 

Finally, Marv left and Lucas closed his eyes and groaned. “Hit me again,” he wearily told the bartender. While he watched the bartender pop the top off of the beer bottle and plop it down in front of him, it saddened him to think that he’d lied so blatantly to his longtime friend. And to make matters worse, he couldn’t share his suspicions about Henry with anyone. No one would believe him. Just then, Hanson’s words came back to him. 

_“Whatever’s up with the Doc,” he’d told Lucas earlier as they’d walked out of the precinct, “Lieu and Jo know what it is and they’re not tellin’ me.” He’d then smirked at Lucas. “But I have my own way of finding out things, too.” _

_ “Awww, they’re probably just trying to find out where he buys all those beautiful scarves he wears,” Lucas joked. _

_“You’re killin’ me,” Hanson deadpanned. “Don’t worry,” he told him as he walked away to his car. “I’ll figure it out.” _

Hmmm. Hanson’s sure that both Jo and the Lieutenant know something about the Doc. He wondered … 


	13. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 13

A couple of swigs into the fourth bottle of beer, Lucas felt, knew, he had reached his limit before his legs no longer read the commands from his brain. He paid his tab at Rick's bar and headed back to his apartment a block and a half away, hoping not to run into Marv again. His level of comfortable inebriation only took some of his concerned thoughts about Henry away. The main one --- what to do next --- bounced up and down against the top of his awareness as he slowly walked up the stairs to his apartment. The entry door's locking mechanism clicked after he punched in his code and he entered the building. Through a growing brain fog, he eventually found himself on his own floor. Marv lived in the same building on the same floor, across the hall and two doors down. But even through his fog, he saw the door to Marv's apartment slightly ajar. Curious, Lucas shook his head and walked closer. 

"Marv?" he called but got no reply. "Hey, buddy, your door's still open." Still no reply. An overturned lamp came into view as he slowly pushed the door open. As he slowly entered, he saw more overturned furniture. It looked like a knock-down, drag-out fight had taken place --- no. It looked like someone had turned the place upside down searching for something. Lucas, now nervous, moved toward the bedroom. The door was wide open and he gulped when Marv's prone body on the floor came into view. He lunged toward his friend, calling his name repeatedly. Lucas fought back a sob as he placed two fingers on the side of Marv's neck and felt for a pulse. None. He covered his mouth with his hand and stood up, then whipped out his cell phone and called 9-1-1. 

vvvv 

Back at Abe's Antiques ... 

Reece, having driven her own car over to the shop, was in the process of sharing goodbyes with Henry, Abe, and Jo. "This has been the most remarkable evening I've ever spent with anyone," she told the two men now known to be father and son. "And even though I still have a lot of questions," she started, "it's getting late and I must get home." 

Henry and Abe both acknowledged that it had been just as remarkable for them, as well. For Henry, because it had been a rare occasion, indeed, for him to have shared his secret with anyone outside of his confidantes and not been met with repercussions. For Abe, because, well, he had never shared his father's secret with anyone else. Not even his two-times former wife, Maureen, or his new lady friend, Fawn. 

Jo had agreed to linger a little longer at Henry's request. Truth be said, she looked forward to some alone time with him. Maybe, she thought, the two of them could explore another subject unconnected to his condition, as he called it. A subject more specific to them becoming a couple. Maybe. Just as Abe opened the shop's door for Reece to exit, Jo's cell phone rang. She fought against the urge to roll her eyes but quickly answered it. "Martinez," she said, controlled frustration in her voice. As she listened, she stiffened and caught Reece's eye, her left hand reaching out towards her to stop her from leaving. "On my way," she quickly replied. 

Reece walked back inside and up to her. "A body, right?" she asked.

Jo bit her lip and nodded. She looked at Reece then at Henry. "It's Lucas' friend, Marv Epstein." 

"Looks like my ride-along has just resumed," Reece stated. 

vvvv 

The two lady cops and their ME converged on the crime scene. While they assessed the state of disarray in the apartment, Henry assessed the state of the body in order to determine the most likely COD. They compared notes and agreed that the place was not only ransacked, several items were missing. Which items, they weren't sure. But since he was a short film buff and filmmaker of sorts, they could only conclude it was a bunch of his filmmaking equipment. 

"We have to speak with Lucas," Henry said. "He knew his friend, visited him occasionally," he added. "Perhaps he can shed some light on what might be missing in here."

Reece nodded. "You two go get him and bring him in here. I'll stay and oversee things."

When Henry and Jo entered Lucas' apartment, they found him sitting on a futon with the TV on but his attention appeared to be elsewhere. Henry and Jo exchanged a look of concern at Lucas' pained expression. They quietly exchanged greetings. 

"Lucas," Henry began, "we need your help at the crime scene." 

"No,' Lucas replied, shaking his head. "Can't go back in there. C-can't ... look at him like that." 

Henry looked at Jo and sighed. He then sat down next to his young assistant. "Marv was your friend," 

"Yeah," Lucas replied. "My buddy."

"You two counted on each other, trusted each other, helped each other," Henry quietly stated, empathizing greatly with him as he grieved the passing of a close friend. But they needed his help to determine what items were missing from the deceased's apartment. It very well could help point them to a suspect and he had to make Lucas understand that.

"Yeah, we --- " Lucas cut off his reply then said, "I don't know why anyone would wanna hurt him." 

"Someone did hurt him, though," Henry said. "Marv can't tell us what happened and who did this to him but your personal knowledge of him and his other associates could help us to identify his attacker." 

"His murderer!" Lucas sorrowfully exclaimed. "He wasn't just hurt, Henry, he was murdered!" 

"And he'd be counting on someone like you, who knew him well, to share your expertise in deciphering his crime scene in order to find his murderer," Henry gently told him but more adamantly. 

Lucas looked at him and sat forward. "Yeah, yeah." He looked from Henry to Jo and back at Henry. "Okay," he said and stood up. "I'll do my best."


	14. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 14

Thanks to Lucas, Team Morgan now had a pretty good idea of what items were missing from Marv Epstein's apartment. The culprit appeared to have targeted his filmmaking equipment, just as they'd suspected. The missing items had a street value of more than $10,000 but the sentimental value had no price. Lucas took it upon himself to notify his friend's next of kin, an aunt and uncle in Trenton, NJ. 

"Poor Lucas," Jo said as she stood in the break room and stirred sugar into her coffee. "He's taking it pretty hard." 

"Yes," Henry replied, pursing his lips. "He'll survive, though," he added. "Lad's a stout fellow." 

Although they were alone, Jo lowered her voice and leaned closer to him. "May I suggest you not refer to him as a 'lad'? No matter how old you are, you only look to be a few years older than him. Not everyone would ... understand you referring to him that way." 

He smiled and dipped his head once deeply. "Understood." He whipped a brown file folder from under his arm and presented it to her. "I came up here to give you this." 

She put her coffee cup down on the counter and opened the file. "And Epstein's COD?" she asked as she began reading its contents. 

"Blunt force trauma to the head," he stated. "It appears that he either fell or was pushed down and hit the back of his head on the edge of the wooden desk in his bedroom." 

"So an accident, not murder," she stated more than asked. 

"Well, his fatal injury was still most likely sustained during a struggle,' Henry replied. "Whoever stole his equipment might attempt to sell it on the black market or --- " 

" --- or pawn it,' Jo finished for him. "Henry, Abe must have an ear to the ground regarding stuff like this. Could you --- " 

"I'll go and call him now," he told her. 

vvvv 

("I'm insulted," Abe told Henry. "What makes you think that I know anything about fencing stolen goods?") 

"You're on speaker, Abraham," Henry cynically warned his son. "There are consequences for lying to the police! Jo's here with me," he clarified, sharing a grin with her. 

"Yeah, Abe," she joined in, grinning. "Don't want me to start Mirandizing you, do you?" 

("A barrel of laughs, you two," Abe deadpanned. "Okay, I'm on it. I'll make a few phone calls and get back to you," he promised. "See how well I can cooperate?" he asked. "That means no charges against me and no jail time.")

"Right," she replied, chuckling. 

("Maybe even a medal, or, or commendation," he excitedly ventured.)

"Don't press your luck," Jo wryly warned him and ended the call. 

vvvv 

Back in the morgue ... 

Henry entered the morgue again and paused at the sight of Lucas sitting at his work station, a forlorn look on his face. He resumed walking and came to stand near his young assistant. "Lucas, you can leave early, if you like," he told him. "Things are rather quiet for now." 

"Uh, thanks, Doc," Lucas replied. "Think I'll just stay here. If I go home, I'll just ... drown my sorrows in a bottle." He met Henry's gaze. "I'd rather be here in case anything goes down." 

Henry pursed his lips and nodded mutely before turning to walk into his office. He stopped when Lucas spoke again. 

"I mean you toughed it out back when ... back when we found the remains of your roommate's mother," Lucas reminded him. "That took a lot of guts; a lot of dedication to duty. I'd like to think I could muddle through a difficult time, too." 

Henry smiled softly and turned to face him again. "That ... was a difficult time," he agreed. Finding the remains of his beloved Abigail had been one of the most disappointing things he'd ever endured. But he also recalled the loss of a close friend more than a century ago. 

"Lucas, I don't presume to know exactly what you're going through right now," Henry began, "but I do know what it's like to lose a close friend; one that I regarded more as a brother." Having gotten Lucas's attention, he continued. "His name was James. James Carter. He died of natural causes but also at a young age." 

"Natural causes? How did he die?" Lucas asked. 

"Tuberculosis," Henry quietly replied. 

"Wow. People don't die of TB nowadays," Lucas pointed out. "Not for decades and decades. Maybe he had a rotten doctor." 

Realizing too late that he'd said too much, he sought to douse any flames of suspicion. "He, ah, unfortunately, chose an alternative method of treatment rather than rely on conventional medicine." He thought it best not to say that it was electric shock treatments. "It had to do with ... over-stimulating the nerves of the body," he half-truthed. "When I found out and went to stop him, too much time had passed and ... it was too late to save him." That was the truth. 

"Sorry," Lucas said, shuddering at the thought. 

"We keep our friends alive in our hearts with memories," he told Lucas. "Good memories. The best ones." 

They said nothing for several moments. "Thanks for sharing that, Henry," Lucas said, a genuine grin on his face. He also felt very appreciative that his secretive boss had finally opened up to him a little.

The desk phone rang in Henry's office and he excused himself to answer it. It was Abe at the other end. "Hello, Abraham. Did you find out anything?" 

("You bet I did," Abe excitedly replied. "I'm at a place called EZ Pawn. The owner believes he may have had an encounter with your perp.")

Henry nodded and frowned as he wrote down the address on Canal Street. "Thank you, Abraham, but in the future, please just call me or Jo. We will do the investigative legwork." He nodded again and rolled his eyes. "Just do as you're told, please. I'll update you later." He hung up the phone and began exchanging his white lab coat for his suit coat and scarf. "I'll be out in the field with Det. Martinez for a while, Lucas." He noticed Lucas eyeing him with an open-mouthed grin. "What is it, Lucas?" he asked.

"Oh, it's, uh, just that if I didn't know any better, it almost sounded like you were talking to a kid," Lucas replied. "But that was your roommate, right?" 

"Ah ... yes," Henry replied. "It's a, ah, running joke with us," he explained with a forced smile. He gulped and quickly made his way out of the morgue.

vvvvvvvv 

Slight references to "Forever" TV show S01/E03 Fountain of Youth and S01/E21 The Night in Question.


	15. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 15

The pawnbroker's name was Max Kreuger and he was able to tell Henry and Jo about a customer named Pete, who had recently tried to pawn some expensive-looking camera equipment. Krueger had become suspicious because this was not the usual fare that Pete brought in and he had refused to accept the items. Based on his information, they'd been able to track Pete down to his home in Queens where they'd questioned him only briefly before he'd admitted to the crime. He'd then led them to a storage unit where the stolen equipment was recovered. To make matters worse, it turned out that Pete's last name was also Epstein because he was Marv's cousin. Lucas had the painful task of not only informing Marv's aunt and uncle --- who'd raised him from age six after he was orphaned --- of his death but also that their son, Pete, had been arrested for his murder. 

Hanson rattled off some of the recovered filmmaking items from the list previously provided by Lucas, pointing to each one as he read. "Six pairs of night vision binoculars, two pairs of 12X Zoom digital binoculars, couple of shoulder mount movie rigs." He lowered the list and looked at each of his colleagues.. "Does it really take all of this to make a movie? I never heard of some of this stuff." 

Jo chuckled. "Me neither," she said. 

"Say, why didn't Kreuger notify us sooner?" Hanson asked. 

"He said that although he thought the equipment might have been stolen, he didn't picture Pete as being the violent type," Jo replied. 

"And when Abe called him," Henry began, "he decided to wait and talk to him and let Abe report it." 

"Well, at least the perp's cooperating with us," Hanson stated, relieved. "And he says it was an accident." 

"Try telling that to his aunt and uncle," Jo huffed. 

"Or to Lucas," Henry somberly added. 

vvvv 

The autopsy completed, Henry placed Marv's body back into its assigned slot in the cooler in order to give Lucas a bit of a break. He admired how well his young assistant had held up during the autopsy, though, and counted himself lucky that he had not had to autopsy his friend, James Carter. As he entered the morgue again to find Lucas seated at his workstation completing some paperwork, they exchanged a nod as he passed by and then he noticed Jo waiting in his office.

"Hello, Detective," he greeted her, smiling. "What can I do for you? 

Lucas, not trying to eavesdrop, looked up in their direction anyway when their voices failed to drift out of Henry's office door. Neither of them were seated. Instead, they stood face-to-face on the side of his desk. Although Jo had her back to Lucas, he could see that she had Henry's full attention by the look of concern on his face. Lucas turned back toward his computer monitor but wondered what the subject of their apparently deep conversation was. Certainly not because they couldn't decide on which restaurant to go to for a date. They both instead would be giddy with delight. And if they had decided to skip the meal and pretense altogether and had gotten stuck on whose bedroom was more inviting, he was sure that the look in Henry's eyes would be desire, not dismay.

No, it was something to do with Marv's case, he concluded. They knew, he told himself. They knew that certain DVD was missing. The same DVD from which Marv had extracted what had turned out to be Henry's strange taxi ride that had ended in the Hudson. Damn! Once they found out that he was the one who had visited the Evidence Lockup recently, they would figure out that he had stolen the DVD. He'd gotten off easy after he'd taken the pugio from the EL and had given it to Henry, who, at the time, had seemed so desperately in need of it. Here he was again, stealing evidence. Only this time, to destroy it but in another effort to help Henry. Although he never knew the significance of the pugio, he felt strongly that it was, nevertheless, connected to what had happened to Henry during his ill-fated taxi ride. His heart rate was up as the detective and his boss slowly walked out of the office and into the morgue. Lucas swallowed and kept his eyes down, pretending to read over a report he'd completed over an hour ago. 

Jo, having been on her phone, ended the conversation and cast a look of suspicion at Lucas. In his peripheral vision, he saw her begin to take a step towards him but then Henry stopped her, shaking his head. Jo, clearly surprised, opened her mouth to say something but closed it, pressing her lips together in an exaggerated pout when Henry almost imperceptibly shook his head again. She sighed, gave another quick glance at Lucas, then turned around and left the morgue. 

Lucas startled slightly when Henry's right hand covered the report he was pretending to study. His eyes slowly raised to meet Henry's. "Uh --- hey, Doc," he managed to stammer out with a hesitant smile. 

"I'd, ah, like to have a little talk with you, Lucas," Henry said. 

Lucas nodded, encouraged by the fact that his boss didn't look angry, so maybe he wasn't going to get fired. Or maybe he was going to let him down easy because Det. Martinez was on her way back to the bullpen to draw up formal charges against him. 

"Sure, sure," Lucas replied. He turned off his computer monitor and stood up. Only then did he notice that Henry had changed into his jacket, his beige scarf hanging loosely around his neck. "Where we going?" he asked. 

"Someplace that affords us more privacy than here," Henry responded. "I feel it's time that I explained some things to you." 

"Okay," Lucas said, a pleased grin working its way across his face. Encouraged that he might finally be cracking the code on his enigmatic boss, he eagerly followed him out of the building. They hailed a cab and headed for Abe's Antiques.

vvvvvvvv

Notes: Information obtained on camera equipment from the Internet.


	16. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 16

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lucas gets let in on Henry's long story. Hanson delivers an ultimatum ... sort of.

"What gives?" Det. Hanson bravely demanded of his boss, Lt. Reece, and his partner, Det. Jo Martinez. His green eyes pierced theirs from under his scowl as he stood in Reece's office with his fists shoved against his hips. 

"Detective --- " Reece began before being cut off by him. 

"Don't Detective me!" he cautioned her. 

"Mike!" Jo interrupted. "Watch yourself; this is our boss you're barking at," she reminded him. 

Seeming to realize the shaky situation he'd set up for himself, he dropped his arms and unballed his fists but released only part of his scowl as he looked at his partner then back at his boss. "Sorry, Lieu," he quietly apologized.

Reece closed her eyes and nodded then raised her head up, keeping her eyes trained on him. "You're feeling a bit left out," she stated. 

"Damn straight!" He shrugged slightly and lolled his head from side to side when Jo slapped him on the arm. "Sorry!" He breathed in deeply and let it out. "It's just that you (he pointed at Reece) and you (he pointed at Jo) know something about the Doc and you're keeping it to yourselves. Keeping it from me. Now, if he's in some kinda trouble, I want in on ... I mean I wanna help, too! I'm part of this team, too, ain't I?" 

Reece inhaled deeply and exhaled as she sat down behind her desk. She gave him a weary, apologetic look before replying, "Yes, you are." 

"And I'm a pretty good detective," he pointed out. 

"Yes, you are," Reece agreed again, sighing. 

"So ... lemme in," he said. "Lemme know what the problem is and how we can help Henry." 

Reece hesitated before replying. She dropped her eyes to her clasped hands then glanced up at Jo. She then looked again at Hanson. "We ... Jo and I ... both stumbled upon something about Dr. Morgan by accident. But neither of us are at liberty to tell you or anyone else what it is." When Hanson set himself to object, she added, "I'm sure that you have his best interest at heart just as we do." 

Hanson quickly nodded and opened his mouth to speak again. 

Reece raised one hand and lowered her head a bit. "Henry has done nothing illegal but it is totally up to him to share his private concerns with you." 

Hanson sighed and placed his hands on his hips, looking away from her. "Okay. Nothing illegal." He then looked back at her. "But like I said. I'm a pretty good detective myself." His scowl softened into a smug smile. 

"What exactly are you trying to say?" Jo warily asked, squinting at him. 

"He's going to do his own digging," Reece dryly concluded. 

"Why?" Jo asked. "We found out by accident," she reminded him. "Henry has never ... intentionally hurt anyone. We all have secrets, private things we don't want to share with anyone else." 

"You're saying that neither of you two checked him out behind his back?" he asked. When met with their silence, he nodded and smiled. "Just as I figured." 

"Why is it so important to you to do this?" Reece asked. "I mean Jo and I had our own reasons but ... what's pushing you?" 

"My wife, Karen," he blurted out. "She wants to meet him. Says he sounds interesting and she won't stop buggin' me about it. Got the boys buggin' me, too. They wanna meet the doctor who cuts dead people up!" He closed his eyes and shook his head vigorously. "Tell you the truth, I'm not so sure I want him in my home like that around my wife and kids if he's, he's ... some kinda ... I don't know what kinda wacko. Don't get me wrong. I like the Doc. But I can take him in small doses at work because he's good at what he does. Great, as a matter of fact. But invite him into my home without checking him out to find out why he's so strange and close-mouthed about himself?" He shook his head, his eyes widened a bit. "Nah, no way." He pointed at them again. "You guys know what's up with him and if you don't tell me, well ... " 

Reece silently studied him for a few moments then looked at Jo, who sighed and dropped her shoulders. 

"Before you do anything," Jo began, "let me talk to Henry first." 

Hanson bored his eyes into hers and said, "Just let him know that I'm on his side; that I can be trusted, too." 

Jo lowered her eyes, blinking, and mutely nodded. 

vvvv 

Abe was standing behind the retail counter in the shop with his back to whomever had just entered. "Be with you in a minute," he said as he turned around. When he saw the look of resignation on Henry's face and the look of anticipated glee on Lucas' face, he knew something was up. "Uh, hey, uh, Henry. Lucas," he awkwardly greeted them. 

"We have a guest," Henry announced. He looked at Lucas and advised him to go upstairs and make himself comfortable, that he would be with him in a moment. Lucas nodded and began ascending the stairs to the second level living quarters.

"This, I can see," Abe replied as he watched Lucas disappear up the stairs. "He stayin' for dinner?" he asked, turning back to his father. Henry pressed his lips together and nodded. "Okay. What's on the, uh, menu? Same thing we 'fed' to our two recent lady guests (Jo and Reece)?" he asked. 

Henry sighed before replying, "It would seem so." 

vvvv 

Miraculously, it took only a few minutes for Henry to confirm his young guest's suspicions about him. A vivid imagination and nearly 20 years of having fed it a diet of graphic novels with increasingly sophisticated and implausible story lines made Henry's job a lot easier than he had ever thought it would be. But no matter how "stupid cool" Henry's condition was to Lucas which made him reach an even higher level of true greatness in the young man's eyes, it was also apparent that he sympathized greatly with him. 

"Wish you didn't have to go through, you know, dying in order to maintain your immortality," Lucas told him. 

"Lucas, my dying from time to time does not maintain my condition," Henry explained. "It's just an unfortunate aspect of it." 

"Oh, is _that_ what it is?" Abe murmured, rolling his eyes. 

Henry drew in a deep breath and held it as he leveled a look of disapproval at his son. 

"And that," Lucas said as he chuckled and wagged a finger between the two of them, "is just as cool. You're the kid (pointing to Abe) and he's the Dad (pointing to Henry)." He continued to softly laugh. "See, I knew it sounded like you were talkin' to a kid during that phone conversation in your office earlier." 

"See, even a stranger picked up on that," Abe said, addressing his father. He looked at Lucas and added, "Will you tell him that I'm grown now and I've been tying my own shoes for the past 65 years?" 

"Abraham, that isn't the point," Henry began. "You potentially put yourself in harm's way when you ran off to investigate a murder case on your own! I was ... worried about your safety," he quietly added. 

"Awww, Pops," Abe replied with a blushing smile. 

"Awww, you guys," Lucas gushed, his voice pitched in a higher register. With a wide grin plastered on his face, he rose from his seat on the sofa and approached Abe. 

"What's he doing?" Abe asked his father out of the side of his mouth. "I don't think I like that gleam in his eyes." 

"He loves to hug," Henry replied with a deep sigh. 


	17. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 17

Henry's office in the OCME the next day ... 

"You've been pretty busy lately," Jo playfully commented after learning that Henry had shared his secret with Lucas the day before. Henry raised his eyebrows, smiling and nodding. Her smile softened as she took in a breath through clenched teeth and released it. "I'm glad you've decided to open up to some of us. It's a good thing, Henry," she assured him. 

He hesitated before replying as his gaze left hers and fixated on Lucas sitting on the other side of the office's glass walls. "I sincerely hope you're right. Only time will tell." 

The way that his eyes appeared to cloud with memories made her curious to know what they were but also made it harder for her to tell him about Hanson's ultimatum delivered to Reece and her yesterday. She turned around and went and shut his office door then returned to sit in one of the chairs facing his desk. "Henry ... Lieu and I had a little talk with Mike yesterday." 

Henry frowned slightly. "About what?" 

"We didn't tell him anything!" she emphatically told him in a whispered tone. "But ... he ... he wants to ... " 

"He wants to know what the two of you know about me," he finished for her. Jo lowered her eyes and nodded. "Dear Lord, when will this end!" he hissed as he rose from his chair and shoved his hands down into the pockets of his white lab coat. 

Jo jumped up and quickly joined him on the other side of the desk. "He doesn't know anything, he just suspects something and ... he just wants to help." 

He scoffed and released a mirthless laugh. "Oh, HE can help me. HE can end my curse!" 

"Henry!" Jo knitted her brow as he rushed past her and began to pace the small distance between his desk and the door. She rushed up to him and met him halfway, placing her hands on his chest, her left thumb resting atop his perennial scar. He briefly wondered if she was aware of it or how her slight touch affected him. And how nice it felt.

The caring and concern in her eyes met the apprehension and doubt in his. In a lowered voice, she stressed that her official partner was just as trustworthy as she and his other two colleagues who already knew. 

He scoffed "Then, of course, by all means, tell him, too," he sarcastically stated. "For that matter, why not I rent out Carnegie Hall and sell tickets? I'm sure there are many more people who would simply love to hear my long, implausible story!" 

Jo dropped her hands from his chest, allowing her arms to flop down and dangle at her sides. She lowered her eyes and searched her mind for the right words to calm his fears. At the same time, his outburst released, Henry felt his anxiety level lessening a bit. Just a bit. It pained him to see her looking so dejected when he knew that all she was trying to do, all she had ever tried to do, was help him and advise him as best she could no matter the circumstances. He slowly and gently took one of her hands in his and squeezed it. With his free hand, he lifted her chin up so that he could look into her eyes. 

"Jo ... I'm sorry," he began. "I didn't mean to raise my voice like that but .... " He paused, licking his lips and releasing a sigh of frustration. "I, I can't ... I simply can't DO this again so soon, Jo." He searched her eyes for any amount of understanding. His anxiety level lessened a little more when he saw it. 

"Henry, I'd be lying if I said I knew exactly what you were going through," she began in earnest, "because I don't. However, I do understand that it's your call. Totally your call." She paused and returned his semblance of a smile. Touching his cheek softly, she added, "When or if you're ready. And that's okay if you never are." 

His smile flattened out and he shook his head, briefly closing his eyes. "It's just that I've never experienced a time in my long life when so many others --- besides Abigail and Abe --- knew of my secret. And ... and generally meant me no harm." He let out a soft laugh. "Your detective partner is a good man, I have no doubts about that. I just need some time." He laughed again when the irony of his own words hit him. For if there was anyone who didn't have to beg for more time, it was Henry Morgan. 

"Lieu and I will talk to him again," she promised him. "We'll make sure he understands that." They both seemed to relax even more and when she gently ran a finger down the side of his cheek and playfully chucked him under the chin, his smile widened into a grin. 

"I leave it in your trusty hands, my dear," he said, bowing slightly. "And thank you; to both of you," he added. 

vvvv 

Reece's office 45 minutes later ... 

"I wanted to keep this short," she said, eyeing Hanson. "But I also wanted to make myself clear," she sternly added. "The situation with Dr. Morgan does not prevent us from performing our duties. He has been a valuable part of our team and will remain so, hopefully, for as long as he wishes." A vision of Henry in a Dr. McCoy-like medical uniform flashed briefly through her mind. Oh, yes, for as long as he wishes. "We will refrain from doing anything to make him feel ... uncomfortable." She felt as though she were channelling her high school English teacher when she'd harshly disciplined her and her classmates for having marginalized a bookwormish student. 

"Like I said, Lieu," Hanson said, flopping a hand up and down, "Doc has nothing to worry about from me. I was just ... blowin' off steam before. Whatever's up with him and you guys know about it ... okay. Okay. I get it. Maybe one day when he's more comfortable sharing it with me, fine. I can wait." 

"Be patient with him, Mike," Lieu urged, her previously stern voice softened. "Remember, Jo and I found out by accident and he merely confirmed our suspicions. He did not willingly share anything with us; and he's still a good guy." 

"We just wouldn't want you or anyone else to do anything to scare him off," Jo told him. 

"Hey, not me, no," he replied, raising both hands in surrender. "His secret --- whatever the hell it is --- is safe with me," he said with a frown of confusion. "Cross my heart and hope to die," he added. 

The two women fought against the urge to rivet their eyes to each other and burst into nervous laughter.

"Good," Reece managed to say. "Glad we're all on the same page, then." 

vvvv 

Notes: 

In the next chapter, Hanson will find out Henry's secret but since I haven't quite formulated it in my mind and my back is killing me, I'll post this newest short chapter instead of having all interested readers wait. Thank you all and for all your comments. Stay safe and healthy.


	18. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 18

Back in the 11th's bullpen, Reece's two top detectives, Martinez and Hanson, sat at their desks and she at hers. Her gaze moved from one to the other and, satisfied that they were both delving into their individual sets of paperwork, she sighed and resumed working on her own. Movement out of the corner of her eye drew her attention back to the detectives. She watched a sallow-faced young woman with long, black hair pause momentarily near Jo's desk until her eyes fell on Hanson. Recognition flashed across her face and she rushed over to his desk. She clutched the strap of her shoulder bag as she seated herself in the chair next to it. Moments after she began to speak to Hanson, he motioned to Jo and she left her desk to join them. Although visitors in the woman's emotional state were not unusual --- it being a Homicide Unit, after all --- the Lieutenant felt concerned. She left her desk, as well, and walked out of her office over to them. As she drew closer, she heard the woman's distraught voice.

"Everything seemed to happen so fast," she was saying. "I just ... lost it," she added, hanging her head and shaking it. 

"Where, uh, did all this take place?" Hanson asked her, his pencil poised over a blue-lined notepad. He wrote down the 85th Street address she gave him and looked back up at her. He repeated the address and she nodded, confirming it was correct. "And you're sure he's dead?" 

"Yes!" the woman, Ruth Carlton, loudly responded. "I told you, I shot him several times. The gun just kept going off over and over and, and ... " Her voice choked on a sob. 

"Okay," Hanson told her. "We'll go check it out. In the meantime, I'm afraid you'll have to remain here."

"Guess I'm under arrest," she stated then sniffled.

"No, we're just gonna go check things out and take it from there," he explained. "But for now, we gotta hold you for a while." She nodded as he motioned for a uni to come over. "Officer Greaves will take you down to holding." While the officer took charge of her, Hanson tore off the page with the address on it, folded it, and pushed it into his inside coat pocket.

"She, um, seemed to recognize you," Jo said. "Who is she?" 

"She looks familiar to me, too," Reece said. They both waited for Hanson to reply. 

"Ruth Carlton," he replied. "Her restaurant catered our Christmas party last year," he explained further.

Reece nodded, recalling the savory food items from the relatively new eatery, CeeBee's, and asked, "Who's the alleged vic?" 

"Says it's her boyfriend and business partner, Thad Boseman," he replied.

Reece sighed and somberly watched Jo and him head out of the bullpen.

"We should take Henry along," Jo proposed as they rode the elevator down to the lobby. 

"We don't need him," Hanson tersely replied. When Jo opened her mouth to protest, he quickly added, "Not until we check this out first." 

Jo decided to use reverse psychology on him. "Okay. I guess it doesn't matter if another ME, say, Dr. Washington, shows up," she said with a shrug of feigned disinterested. She held her laughter when Hanson put his hand up to his forehead and closed his eyes. 

"Call, him!" he told her, relenting. He lowered his hand and frowned at her as she called Henry on her cell phone. "He would be the best," he muttered under his breath. 

vvvv 

Reece had put out a call for the nearest patrol car to secure the scene. The detectives were met outside the door of the couple's Jackson Heights apartment by a perplexed uni, Officer Tracy Madison. 

"We found nothing, Detectives," Madison told them as she followed them across the threshhold into the living room of 4D. "No body, no blood, no weapon." She motioned a hand around. "Sure this is the right address?" she asked. 

Hanson, astonished, snatched the small piece of paper out of his pocket and studied it. "Yeah, it's the right one," he affirmed and handed the paper to a wide-eyed Jo. 

She read it and folded it back up, biting on her lower lip.

"Maybe she's a, you know, head case," Hanson speculated.

Jo looked around at the photos as Henry often did when in the home of a potential witness or suspect. None of them seemed to jump out at her except for the fact that their would-be suspect and victim appeared to be very happy in each one displayed in a collage that hung on the wall next to the fireplace. "They look happy in these," she pointed out. Although a seasoned detective herself, she felt that Henry's powers of observation were greatly needed here. 

"Yeah. Maybe," Hanson replied as his wary gaze rested on the photos then danced from one item to the other in the room. If this had been even a day before he'd met Dr. Henry Morgan and gotten introduced to his way of nit-picking through a crime scene, he would have written the woman off as some kind of kook and had her shipped off to Bellevue for observation. But the very thorough ME had taught all of them, including him, that simple might be easier but not always the best way to work a case. Okay, Doc, you win, he told himself. 

"What are you thinking?" Jo asked him. 

"Let's have a longer look around," he replied. "I'll start in the bedroom. You take the bathroom." She nodded and headed toward it down the hallway while he instructed Ofc. Madison to secure the crime scene. 

"What, uh, where, Detective?" she asked, perplexed. Her eyes darted quickly over the room then imploringly back at him. 

"Just ... keep everybody out," he told her. Madison nodded and began to close the entry door. He placed his hand on the door to prevent her from closing it fully and said, "Get CSU down here to dust the place." When met with a questioning attitude again, he said, "Just do it."

He headed to the bedroom to look for what, he wasn't sure. But if he didn't know any better, he was channeling the thoughts and actions of his enigmatic ME colleague. At least, he hoped he was. Ruth Carlton had seemed so upset and so sincere in her claim of having killed Thad Boseman. Not that he wanted the guy to be dead, more that he didn't want the woman to be a nut case.

_'Simple is easier, Doc, but I'm tryin' it your way today.' _


	19. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 19

Hanson searched the master bedroom that had an attached bath in the apartment while Jo searched a second bathroom and a room used as an office. Finding nothing that really jumped out at them, they met in the hallway and headed toward the small kitchen area. As Jo searched the upper cabinets and refrigerator, Hanson searched the lower cabinets and opened the top of the small garbage pail. He paused to share an eyeroll of disgust with Jo. When she suggested he leave it for the CSU, he quickly agreed and put the lid back onto it. He straightened up and looked around the living room again, his gaze coming to rest on the area between the end of the sofa and the entry door where Ruth Carlton had said Boseman had collapsed after she'd shot him several times. They were both gratified to see the CSU members begin to sweep in with their equipment. During a brief exchange of identification and information, loud voices were heard in the hallway. 

"Sorry, Sir, but you can't go in there," Ofc. Madison was heard telling someone. 

"What do you mean I can't go in? I live here!" a male voice defiantly responded to her. 

Hanson and Jo quickly approached the entry door and he opened it. They were met with Madison sternly warning a man Hanson knew to be the supposed shooting victim, Chad Boseman. "We'll take it from here, Officer," Hanson said. He and Jo stepped into the hallway and explained the situation to him and that they'd appreciate if he'd go downtown with them to help clear things up with his girlfriend, Ruth. 

Chad, both frustrated and annoyed, took in a deep breath and released it. "She did shoot at me," he told them, "with this." He opened his jacket, displaying a semi-automatic Glock 19. "I started carrying it after I was mugged a couple of months ago. Just haven't loaded it yet."

Hanson extended his hand, indicating for Chad to hand it to him, which he did. Hanson checked it and discovered it to be unloaded. "We're gonna have to keep this for a while," he told Chad and dropped it into a ziploc bag, sealing it. 

"We'd like you to come downtown with us to help straighten this out," Jo told him.

"Where is she?" Chad asked. "You didn't believe her and arrest her, did you?" 

"She's in holding right now," Hanson replied. He extended an arm toward the elevator at the end of the hall and Chad reluctantly accompanied them. 

vvvv 

Chad sat on one side of the table with Jo and Hanson on the other side as they questioned him in the interview room. Henry and Reece watched unseen on the other side of the glass. Reece stood to Henry's right with her hands clasped in front of her. He stood with his hands clasped behind him. Although Jo had alerted him earlier to the need for him to meet them at what they had been told was a crime scene, he had soon gotten the word that his "services" would not be needed after all since there was neither a body nor any bloody evidence that a crime had occurred. He didn't want to jump to any conclusions but his curiosity was piqued over the details. Had the alleged victim's body vanished like his always did after dying? The fact that only a couple of parking tickets from three months ago had popped in the system for Boseman, didn't necessarily rule him out as possibly being an Immortal. Maybe he just knew how to "manage" his condition a little better. Maybe Ruth Carlton was simply insane or a liar. He chose to pin his hopes on the latter being true. 

"Tell us what happened," Jo told him. 

"We were discussing the restaurant's books again, bleeding red," he began. "She wants to hit her parents up for a loan, but I don't, I don't want that. Things got kinda heated and she grabbed my gun out of the holster and ... shot at me." His voice grew quiet as he recalled the incident. 

Jo and Hanson exchanged a look before Jo asked, "Did she think it wasn't loaded?" she asked, incredulous.

He hesitated before replying, his eyes troubled. "I ... I don't know." He swallowed and sat up taller. "She had to have known and was just ... trying to scare me." 

"Has something like this happened before where she tried to kill ya?" Hanson asked. 

Chad pulled his lips in and released another sigh of dismay. "Yeah." He leaned forward and eyed one to the other. "Look, we have disagreements like any other couple. Doesn't mean she really wants to, to kill me," he stated with more than a bit of uncertainty. 

"Well, like what?" Hanson prompted him. "Has she tried knives, uh, strangulation, poison, what?" 

"No, no, nothing like that," Chad objected, shaking his head. "She --- Nothing." He leaned back in his chair and lowered his eyes to the table top under his hands. "Look, if no crime has been committed --- I mean I'm here and in one piece --- can I just go home and take her with me?" 

"You're not pressing charges against her?" Hanson asked. Personally, he'd show the chick the door so quick, her crazy head would spin. 

"No," Thad quietly but firmly replied. 

"You're not worried that she might try this again?" Jo pressed. She couldn't believe it. 

"Can we go now?" Thad impatiently asked, ignoring her question. 

"You can," Hanson informed him as he gathered up his pencil and notepad. "Maybe she can after her psychological evaluation." 

"Psychological ... Bellevue," Thad muttered resignedly. "Can I see her before I leave?" 

"I don't think that would be wise just now," Jo told him. 

The two detectives stood up as did Thad but more slowly and the three of them left the room. Thad left the building and the detectives joined their boss and their ME in the hallway. As Reece led them down the hall and back into the bullpen, they discussed the strange case of the woman who swears she shot a man to death but the living corpse had just contradicted her claim. But since Hanson still had not been let in on Henry's secret of also being some kind of living corpse, the other three had to remember to keep their remarks within the realm of normalcy. 

"Maybe we should let her see him," Hanson said. "It might shake those crazy thoughts out of her mind to see him alive and healthy after she said she killed him." He chuckled and added, "Nobody comes back from the dead." He walked away from them to his desk seeming not to notice the knowing looks his three colleagues exchanged. 

"I shall, ah, return to the morgue," Henry told the two women. He dipped his head slightly and with a smile, turned and left. 

"Hopefully, this will be the last we see of Ruth Carlton," Jo said as they walked to her desk and she sat down. 

"Hmmm. I wouldn't count on it," Reece replied. "But I'm glad that the 'situation' wasn't as bad as we thought it would be." She returned to her office leaving Jo biting back her laughter and thankful that Hanson was preoccupied on the phone and most likely had not heard Reece's cryptic statement. 


	20. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 20

In the morgue, Lucas was on a phone call with a local mortuary in anticipation of them picking up the remains of a slip-and-fall bathroom victim. Just as he was ending the call, he saw his boss, Dr. Henry Morgan, enter the morgue. As he drew closer, Lucas could see that he appeared to be deep in thought. Thankfully, it did not appear that his deep thoughts were from worry or embarrassment after having shared his secret of living an exceptionally long life with him and their two female colleagues. He wondered if it was because he was deciding on just how or when he would bring Hanson into his small circle of confidants. Lucas laughed inwardly at the detective’s possible reaction. He was such a down-to-earth kinda guy, who saw most everything in shades of black and white. Then he was reminded that the ME Extraordinaire might simply be plotting new moves to put on his beautiful Latina detective partner. 

The two men acknowledged each other with a slight nod as Henry never broke stride and entered his office. A few moments later, he emerged with his hands shoved down into the pockets of his white lab coat. 

“How’d the interrogation go?” Lucas asked, remembering it at the last minute. 

“Interesting,” Henry responded, taking a few steps closer to him. 

“Interesting because the supposed victim is alive and well with no bullet holes in him?” he fished. “No … blood at the crime scene?” he fished further. 

Henry smiled slightly. “I know what you’re thinking, Lucas; but I don’t believe that this case involves anything like …,“ He paused, taking in a deep breath and releasing it as he quickly surveyed the near-empty morgue. “ … what you and I discussed earlier.” 

Lucas nodded deeply. “Copy that.” He scratched the top of his head and showed a nervous grin to Henry before asking, “What do you think happened, then?” It didn’t matter so much what any suspect or witness told them for in the end, it was usually his boss’ unequaled powers of deduction that broke the case. 

“Personally, I would like to have a talk with --- “ 

“ --- the loony lady!” Lucas loudly speculated, cutting him off. 

“Yes,” Henry replied. “But more so with the therapist assigned to her at Bellevue.” He didn’t mind going back to that hospital now since he knew there was no chance for him to run into Adam posing as Dr. Lewis Farber. It shouldn’t have but it comforted him even more that Adam had been recently transferred to a long-term care facility on Houston Street. “Once Ms. Carlton has been evaluated, we should be able to get a better perspective on what really happened between her and her paramour.” 

“Paramour,” Lucas repeated, grinning widely and shaking his index finger at Henry. “See, that, that’s what I like about the way you drop words. Sounds more romantic than Bae.” 

Henry frowned and silently mouthed Bae as if it were a derogatory term not to be uttered in polite company. Lucas planted both his feet on the floor and turned to face him with both hands raised as he began to explain the term when Jo’s voice distracted both of them. 

“Hey, you guys,” she greeted them, smiling. They returned her greeting and she turned her attention to Henry. “Got a minute?” 

“Of course,” he replied with a pleasant smile. He stepped aside and extended his arm toward his office door. She walked inside and seated herself in one of the two guest chairs and he followed her in, seating himself behind his desk. 

Lucas tapped his computer back to life and opened up his company email but fought against a widening grin at the thought of his favorite ship spending time with each other even if it was to discuss a case. 

“Some people imagine that they hear voices or have an imaginary friend,” Jo dryly remarked. “Ruth Carlton has an imaginary murder victim.” 

“Please,” Henry replied disdainfully, frowning and flinging a hand up then down. “You’re too intelligent to take on Washington’s bad habits.” 

“Just kidding,” she told him, leaning forward with a mischievous grin. She sighed and leaned back in her chair. “No dead body.” When he didn’t respond, she said, “Maybe a different kind of dead body.” 

“I seriously doubt it,” he finally replied. At her questioning look, he leaned forward and continued in a lowered voice. “Boseman is not like me. There’s something else afoot here but I can’t be certain until after I’ve spoken with Ms. Carlton’s therapist. Only then can we truly determine if she’s mentally impaired.” 

“You said ‘If’. You’re not convinced that she is,” she stated. 

He raised his hand and rubbed his chin between his thumb and index finger. “No,” he plainly replied. 

vvvv 

The next morning in Bellevue Hospital … 

A more refreshed looking Ruth Carlton sat in the upholstered armchair across from the therapist assigned to her, Dr. Patrick Werner. The handsome, sandy-haired, thirty-something waited patiently for her to respond to his last question. His brown eyes strayed away from hers and studied her various facial points, then found her eyes again. 

“You haven’t answered my question,” he told her. “I’ve only just been assigned to you but I need you to answer me or we can’t continue.” 

“Yes,” she finally replied, squaring her shoulders and sticking her chin out. “I think our plan is … right on track.” A smug smile slowly took over their features. Werner left his seat and she stood up. They closed the short distance between them, embraced each other, and indulged in a lust-filled kiss. 


	21. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 21

Detectives Martinez and Hanson stood in Lt. Reece’s office while she informed them that Ruth Carlton’s therapist, Dr. Werner, had completed his initial evaluation of her but refused to give them the green light to question her again. Visibly frustrated, Hanson suggested they simply “get the goods” from Werner, then. 

Reece smiled before replying. “He said he’ll be in his office after 3:00 PM today. In the meantime, what did you find out about our ‘shooter’ and her boyfriend?” 

“Records show that they’ve lived there for nearly three years,” Jo began. “But, according to their employees and a few of their neighbors, Thad spends long hours in their restaurant.” 

“Smart move,” Hanson chortled. “If my girl got her kicks by trying to off me every now and again, I’d keep distance between us, too.” 

vvvv 

“Sounds like a miserable life,” Jo remarked, frowning as she and Henry stood outside Dr. Werner’s office at Bellevue. She knocked on the door and said, “Hard to believe we didn’t find any domestic disturbance reports on them.” 

“Sadly, not something that most people wish to report,” Henry said. “But although 85% of women report being victimized by their intimate private partner, surprisingly, more than 40% of men report the same.” He pressed his lips together and looked at her with raised eyebrows while they waited for their knock to be acknowledged. 

Jo knocked again but they still got no answer. She tried the door handle but found it locked. She then pulled a plastic gift card out of her pocket, looked up and down the hall before silently instructing Henry to cover her, and slid it between the door lock and the door jamb. 

“What, no hairpin, Detective?” Henry whispered, a teasing smirk on his lips. 

“Just keep a look out,” she returned. 

The lock clicked and the door opened inward slightly. She opened it wider and Henry quickly turned around and slipped into the office behind her. They closed the door and each released a held breath. Neither was sure what they’d find --- especially without a warrant --- but Jo was counting on Henry’s ability to find something, anything, to help in the investigation. She knew he had a hunch and was willing to let him loose in the “playground” to see what he might uncover. 

“So why do you think Ruth Carlton might be faking mental impairment?” Jo asked. She smiled as she watched him scour the office with his penetrating stare. It was fun to watch him work. Even more fun was when his face would light up with that cute “Aha” moment of his. “You only read her statement. You didn’t see her when she walked into the precinct and confessed.” 

“Fair point,” he acknowledged. “But her statement was too precise. Almost as if it had been rehearsed, memorized. Plus, you and Hanson both described how she looked, her demeanor.” He shook his head as he walked away from the framed certificates on the wall and joined her near the brown, leather couch. 

“I’ve been locked up in asylums more than once,” he began to explain in a voice softened by sad remembrance. “I have firsthand experience interacting with the mildly emotionally disturbed all the way to the criminally insane. The more insane the person was, the more rambling and incoherent their speech was. And most people who are insane vehemently deny it.” 

The memories of what she was certain were unspeakable horrors and wrongs done to him in those places, passed darkly over his countenance. “Henry, I don’t mean to minimize what you went through but are you really qualified to make that diagnosis of her, or are you working from a hunch?” 

His shoulders dropped as he released a quick breath and clamped his lips together. “A hunch,” he conceded. “But my hunches are usually right,” he reminded her with a slight dip of his head. A stern, male voice stole their attention. 

“This looks like a break-in,” Werner said accusingly. He stood near the open door with one hand on his hip. “Mind telling me what you two are doing in my office that was locked?” 

“It was unlocked,” Jo lied with a straight face. Decades of practice allowed Henry to have a straight face, too, as they both maintained direct eye contact with him. She held her badge up for him. “Det. Jo Martinez, NYPD. This is my partner, Dr. Henry Morgan of the OCME.” She clipped her badge back onto the waistband of her jeans. “We had a 3:00 appointment with you.” 

Werner squinted at the badge and at them. Seeming to relent, he motioned toward the couch and they sat down. He sat in the armchair across from them, a trace of skepticism still on his face. “I was sure the door was locked,” he said more to himself. “The maintenance folks will check it later. But we had no appointment,” he corrected her. “I simply told Lt. Reece that I would be in my office after 3 but … no matter. What can I do for you?” 

Relieved that if he hadn’t bought Jo’s lie, for the moment, he couldn’t dispute it. “Please fill us in on the results of your initial evaluation of Ruth Carlton,” Jo requested. 

He scoffed. “Apparently, she’s been under a lot of stress regarding the viability of the restaurant she owns and runs with her, uh, boyfriend.” 

Almost imperceptibly, he flinched on that word although it didn’t go unnoticed by Henry. 

“Her stress level moved her to commit murder?” Jo asked. 

“Not murder, as I understand it," he volleyed back. "Mr. Boseman was not injured at all. But in her mind, she heard every one of those gunshots. In her mind, she killed him. The stress and worry stem from how badly her business partner and _lover _mismanaged the place and constantly blamed her for the business failing,” he replied. A thread of disdain --- or jealousy --- laced the tone of his voice. This time both Jo and Henry caught it. 

“Dr. Werner,” Henry began, “Had you met either Ms. Carlton or Mr. Boseman before this incident?” 

“What has that got to do with anything?” He appeared to bristle as he replied. “I know them --- of them like most anyone else does who’s visited their restaurant.” He looked from one to the other and abruptly stood up. “Look, I’ve given you more of my time than planned. My next patient is due at any moment.” 

“How soon can we get a copy of your written evaluation of her?” Jo asked as she and Henry stood up. 

“When I get time,” he tersely replied. “Soon as I can,” he added in a more acquiescent tone. 

vvvv 

“Something’s rotten in Denmark,” Henry said as he buckled his seatbelt in Jo’s car. 

“I dunno about Denmark,” Jo said as she started up the car. “But it stinks to high Heaven in there.” 

vvvvvvvv 

Information on domestic violence statistics by gender found on the Internet.


	22. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 22

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bit of a Jenry moment. The case heats up.

Only moments after Jo and Henry drove away from the hospital, Thad Boseman pulled up in a cab and hurriedly exited it. He checked the time on his phone as he rushed into the building and down the corridor to Werner’s office. 

“Come in,” Werner said when he heard a few rapid knocks. He looked up to see Thad enter, the worry in his hazel eyes evident. “Mr. Boseman. Have a seat, please,” he said with a smile that failed to reach his eyes. 

vvvv 

Jo’s car sped away from the hospital. “Martinez,” she said, answering her cell phone. It was Hanson, telling her that a possible witness had walked into the precinct. “Okay, be there in a few.” She ended the call and smiled at Henry, who had gathered the gist of the conversation. “Hopefully, this Debbie Chang can help shed more light on this case,” she said. 

“My thoughts, exactly,” he concurred. 

They rode in silence for several minutes before she asked, “How many times, Henry?” 

A bit surprised, he looked at her then looked straight ahead, his features flattening out. Realizing that he shouldn’t be surprised after what he’d told her about his experiences in asylums, he mentally geared himself up to reply. “Five,” was all he said. 

Jo swallowed, not sure if she should continue. But her curiosity had gotten the better of her. “Was each time because --- “ 

“ --- of my condition?” he said, finishing her question. “You might say. The first time was when my first wife, Nora, had me committed because she didn’t believe my claim of immortality,” he explained. “Each time after that was actually to imprison me; punish me. People usually feared me when my condition was revealed. Was even once accused of being a sorcerer,” he said with a mirthless laugh. His chest slowly expanded and he quickly released the breath. “Are you sure you want me to tell you this, Jo?” 

She reached over and placed her hand on his, squeezing it. “I want you to know that you can tell me anything, Henry,” she said. They’d arrived at the precinct but she turned off the car and turned in her seat to face him. “You have me to confide in now,” she added, softly smiling. 

He looked down at her hand still atop his, the contact warm and delightful as her thumb gently rubbed across his fingers. If only he could enjoy this moment with her, more moments like this; take it a little further, he thought. There always seemed to be an interruption of one kind or the other that prevented them from --- 

“Hey! Ya wanna move it?” a young uni barked at them, pointing to the fire hydrant in front of the car. He blanched when Jo flashed her badge at him. “Oh, oh, sorry, uh, Detective,” he floundered as he backed away a bit. “Didn’t recognize ya. Looked like you guys were, uh, you know.” He released a nervous laugh then schooled his features when met by Jo’s stony stare. 

Once inside the precinct, they quickly made their way into the bullpen. There they saw a young Asian woman seated next to Hanson’s desk and slowly stirring a cup of coffee as she nervously surveyed the room. When Hanson saw them, he motioned for them to come closer. 

“This is Ms. Chang, the possible witness I told you about,” Hanson said. He looked down at her and said, “This is my partner, Det. Jo Martinez and this is our crime consultant, Dr. Henry Morgan of the OCME.” He then suggested they go into the small conference room on the other side of the room. 

“Okay, Ms. Chang,” Hanson began as they all seated themselves around the conference table. “First of all, thank you for coming in on your own.” 

“Well, I heard what happened from another co-worker,” she said. “I figured it was my duty to tell you what I know about … about Ruth and her boyfriend.” 

“Thad Boseman,” Jo stated. 

Debbie shook her head. “No. A doctor, uh, Dr. Werner. He’d been to the restaurant a few times. About six months ago, he came in just before closing asking for Ruth. It wasn’t often she hung around that late; that’s why I remember it. Plus, he looks like a movie star,” she drooled. Getting back on track, she continued. 

“They spent about 20 minutes together in her office. Only she or Thad sign the replenishment orders so I knocked on the office door. When I heard what sounded like muffled screams coming from within, I knocked louder on the door, calling out to Ruth if she was all right. She eventually opened the door but only partially. She looked … flushed and sweaty, mussed up.” Debbie sighed, averting her eyes, obviously embarrassed at the memory. “She grabbed the paperwork from me and scrawled her signature then thrust it back at me. It soon hit me that she and the movie star guy had been,” she paused with a huff. 

“You sure of that?” Hanson asked, getting her drift. 

“Look, I know what gettin' it on sounds like,” she replied in a raised voice. 

He rolled his eyes over to Jo and Henry, then back to Debbie, and raised a hand to indicate for her to continue. 

“Then, she tells me she’s been meaning to promote me to Head Cashier. But I was not to say anything to anyone about him or what had happened.” 

“A bribe,” Jo stated. 

“Yeah,” Debbie responded. “But, hey, I needed the money so I … kept my mouth shut.” 

“So, why are you saying anything about it now?” Hanson asked. 

“Feel like I’m helping her hide behind a lie,” she confessed. 

At those words, Henry’s brow furrowed as he lowered his head and pursed his lips. Jo tensed as she took in a deep breath and slowly released it, neither trusting themselves to look at the other. Her words hit Hanson, too, reminding him of the Lieutenant and Jo guarding the secret that Henry was apparently hiding. A secret also withheld from him. He shook off the feeling of being left out and concentrated once again on Debbie. 

“She and Thad have not been getting along for more than a year,” Debbie continued. “Word is she’s tried to hurt him a few times before she tried to shoot him. If you ask me, she’s trying to kill him.” 

“Why do you think that?” Hanson asked. “What would she have to gain?” 

“Life insurance money,” Debbie replied. “A million-dollar umbrella policy cashed in would more than pay the restaurant’s bills and buy a romantic getaway with Dr. Stud Muffin,” she sarcastically added. “I mean Thad’s not bad looking himself and he’s a nice guy.” She looked over at Henry. “You kinda remind me of him,” she noted, chuckling. Her attention returned to the conversation. 

“But the heart wants what the heart wants, as they say,” she continued. “And like I said, Thad’s a good guy but she hasn’t been good for him in a long time.” 

vvvv 

Reece joined her two detectives and their ME as they watched Debbie leave the bullpen. They filled her in on what Debbie had told them. She suggested they contact Dr. Werner again so his patient could be re-interviewed. 

“Don’t divulge anything to him about what you just learned from Ms. Chang,” Reece told them. “We don’t want to give anything away. And if he still refuses, I’ll go over his head,” she said matter-of-factly. Going over another professional’s head was not something she took lightly. In this instance, though, Werner had to be treated the same way a suspected dirty cop would be. They had to get at the truth somehow without showing their hand. 

A few moments later, while Henry sat in the chair next to her desk, Jo called Werner’s office to request the re-interview but was told that Ruth had been released. “Do you think that’s wise?” she asked, alarmed. She fought against huffing her frustration into the mouthpiece of her desk phone. “Thank you,” she said and hung up. Both she and Henry stood up. 

“Did I hear right?” Hanson asked, leaving his desk and rushing over to hers. “He released that crazy bird?” 

“Perhaps we should find out where Mr. Boseman is,” Henry suggested. 

Jo already had her phone up to her ear. “One step ahead of you,” she told him. 

vvvv 

Earlier in Werner’s office … 

Thad rapped a knuckle on Werner’s office door. When he heard a voice bid him to come in, he opened the door and saw a man, who was a frequent visitor to their restaurant, seated behind the desk. He was both surprised and relieved to see the somewhat familiar face of the person designated as his troubled girlfriend’s therapist. 

“Mr. Boseman. Have a seat, please,” Dr. Werner said, motioning toward the thickly-upholstered armchair. He left his desk and sat down on the couch that faced Thad where he sat in the armchair. “I’m sorry you came all the way over here for nothing.” 

Thad frowned, confused. “What do you mean ‘nothing’?” 

“You and my patient, Ms. Carlton, are not married,” Werner began to explain. “Therefore, I can divulge nothing to you regarding either her diagnosis or prognosis.” 

“I know, I know, the rules,” he impatiently stated while patting a hand at him. He spread his hands helplessly and asked, “Could you just tell me when she’ll be released and I can take her home, then?” 

“All I can tell you is that when she is released, it will be totally up to her if she chooses to leave with you or not,” he replied matter-of-factly. His desk phone rang and he excused himself and answered it. He put a hand over the mouthpiece and apologized to Thad, saying that the call was urgent. 

A disappointed and frustrated Thad read it as his cue to leave and he did. Once outside the building, he checked his phone again but saw the low battery icon just before it beeped and closed down. He ran a hand through his dark brown curls and cursed himself for not having charged it in time. Just another thing that was working against him, he ruefully told himself. For the first time in a long time, he didn’t feel like going to the restaurant. The bleed on the books on top of everything else had finally taken away his need to bury his troubles in the workings of the restaurant. But he refused to give his business to any of his competitors. Home. He’d go home and try to drown his troubles there in the bottom of whatever bottle of wine he reached for first. 

Back in Werner’s office, he conversed with the person on the other end of the line. “Just be patient,” he said. “I didn’t tell him a thing. Wait for him to come home and as soon as he opens the door and steps into the room --- ,” He grinned and nodded his head. “He won’t know what hit him. And you and I, baby, will be home free. Just make sure the gun is loaded this time.” 

vvvv 

Back to now … 

Hanson reached voicemail on Thad’s cell phone. He left an urgent message for him to call back. “Neither of them is at the restaurant,” he told them. "According to the assistant manager, he went to the hospital hoping to bring his girlfriend home today.” 

“Sounds like a setup,” Henry warned. “The young man could be walking right into a trap.” 

“You don’t think he picked her up from the hospital and took her home, then,” Jo stated more than asked. 

“No,” Henry warned. “She may already be there … waiting for him.” 

“And since her sanity has already been called into question …,” a horrified Jo said, her voice trailing off. 

“She could really finish him off this time, plead diminished capacity, and probably do no more than 18 months in a mental hospital,” Hanson said, shaking his head. 

“We should let Lieu know so she can put a tail on Werner,” Jo said. Hanson nodded and placed the call. Jo concentrated on the traffic in front of her as she sped toward the apartment Thad shared with Ruth. 


	23. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 23

While Lt. Reece assigned two unis to shadow Werner, Team Morgan scrambled to save Thad from what might be a true death at the hands of his live-in girlfriend and business partner, Ruth Carlton. 

“See what else you can come up with on Werner and Carlton,” Reece instructed Det. Kit Harper. She nodded mutely and entered their names into CODIS to begin with. Reece knew that Henry had had his doubts about Ruth almost from the beginning, even though he had not seen her or interviewed her. And based on what Debbie Chang had shared with them, suspicion had now been cast on Werner. Because of those reasons and Henry’s amazing track record for sniffing out bad guys from even the slimmest of leads, she felt it was worth it to paint a fuller picture of the two. Her fingers drummed on the desk as she waited in her office to hear either from someone out in the field or from Harper outside her door. She didn’t have to wait long. 

Harper caught Reece’s eye and motioned her over to her desk. Once there, the detective pointed out a surprising detail about Ruth Carlton and Patrick Werner. Although this new information was surprising, it was not shocking. Years of dealing with all kinds of perps committing all kinds of crimes for all kinds of reasons, this newly-uncovered detail failed to shock her. There was no time to dwell on it, though; no time to ponder yet again why people did such dastardly things to each other. 

“Send that to me,” she told Harper as she hurried back into her office. She immediately got on the phone and relayed the information to her team in the field. 

vvvv 

“Wow. Thanks, Lieu,” Jo said. “No, Thad hasn’t shown up to his home yet. We’ll keep you posted,” she added and ended the call. Turning to her two colleagues, she said, “Well. Just found out why Ruth and Thad aren’t married.” She waited a couple of beats before delivering the bombshell. “She’s already married to Werner.” 

They speculated why and how Thad had hooked up with Ruth but unanimously agreed that he may have been merely a pawn in the couple’s get-rich-quick scheme. Although it saddened them to think of the emotional pain Thad may have already endured, they were determined to thwart the two grifters. 

Hanson perked up and exclaimed, “There he is!” 

All three of them jumped out of the car and jogged up to Thad as he exited a cab. They quickly broke the bad news to him about his girlfriend, who wasn’t really his girlfriend, and her therapist, who wasn’t really her therapist. Stunned, speechless, and disappointed, he slowly lowered himself to the bottom step of the entry stairs. 

“I knew something was wrong,” he said barely above a whisper, “but I had no idea it was anything like this.” He looked up at them, his eyes misted over. “Well,” he scoffed. “Good thing I was never able to scrape together enough money to buy her an engagement ring, right?” A mirthless laugh left him with the threat of tears not far behind. But he somehow managed to maintain his composure. He then stood back up, his fists clenched. “I gotta go talk to her.” 

“That wouldn’t be wise,” Henry warned him. “As soon as you walk through that door, she’ll most likely attack you again.” 

“And this time it’ll be for real,” Hanson concluded. “Let us handle it.” 

Thad studied them for a moment and then hung his head. “Okay,” he breathed out, shaking his head vigorously. “But you won’t hurt her,” he said, hopefully. “I mean even though she’s betrayed me … I still love her.” He frowned and breathed deeply in and out. “Doesn’t make any sense, does it?” 

“It makes perfect sense,” Henry quietly replied to him. 

Jo saw Henry’s eyes cloud over briefly with sad remembrance. Nora, she silently concluded. He must be thinking of her and what she did to him. So long ago but he still carries the pain of it with him. 

Thad sighed and looked resignedly at Hanson. “Okay. I’ll let you guys handle it. Just … don’t hurt her.” 

Hanson nodded deeply as he led Thad over to their assigned car and opened the front passenger side door. Thad settled himself inside the car and Hanson shut the door, telling him to just hang tight. As he walked back and rejoined Jo and Henry, he wondered what exactly the plan was. Barge in, haul her back down to the precinct, and get her to confess after a mind-numbing third degree? Go in and have a nice friendly chat with her, hoping she’ll just fess up out of remorse and make their job easier? It was fast becoming evident to him, though, that Jo was buying into Henry’s suggested plan of action of standing in for Thad???. He felt he had to speak up. 

“You gotta be kiddin’ me,” Hanson told him. “Doc, you don’t even look like him. Maybe the same height and build, same eye color, the, the curly top hair thing goin’ on but it’s not enough! Besides, Jo and I are the cops,” he reminded him. “You could get hurt. There is no good reason for you to chance takin’ a bullet!” He watched in frustration and disbelief as Henry ignored him and removed his scarf and gold pocket watch. 

“Hold onto these for me,” he said with a soft smile as he handed them to Jo. She returned his smile and took the items, stuffing them down into her jacket pocket. 

“Jo, I can’t believe you’re goin’ along with this!” he growled at her. 

“Mike,” she began, “just stay here with Thad. Henry and I will be fine.” Henry echoed her sentiments to him and they jogged up the stairs. Using Thad’s entry code and his apartment key in hand, they entered the building. 

“For the love of …,” He watched them disappear into the building and then glanced over at Thad struggling to keep his nerves under control as he sat in the car. He thanked his lucky stars when he noticed a patrol car coming down the street. He waved his arm and held up his badge with his other hand as they rolled closer. The two unis got out of the car but the one driving remained with the vehicle while the other quickly walked over to Hanson. He explained the situation to them and commandeered them to keep an eye on Thad while he went inside to help his partner. Jo’s gonna kill me, he thought to himself as he used Thad’s code to enter the building. Luckily, he caught up with them just as Henry was about to insert the key into the apartment door’s lock. They looked up at him, startled, and Henry pulled back. 

“Mike, you were supposed to stay with Thad!” Jo growled a whisper at him. 

“Thad’s fine,” he told her, keeping his eyes on Henry. “Corralled a couple of unis to keep an eye on him.” 

Henry smiled slightly, raising his eyebrows. “I’m glad you’re here, Mike. It’s time you learned what my … big secret is, anyway.” 

“Are you sure, Henry?” Jo asked him. 

“Yes,” he replied, keeping eye contact with the other man. “And rest assured if anything untoward does happen to me, I’ll be fine.” With that, he unlocked the door and slowly opened it. He bowed his head and covered most of his face with his left hand as he entered the apartment, knowing that if they were right, Ruth would be zinging a bullet his way at any moment. 

Although he’d told his two colleagues that in the end, he’d be fine --- and one believed him and one didn’t --- he still feared death. There was just no “good” way to die, he had learned over the past two centuries. And because he still had no idea why or how he’d been burdened with this type of long life, he knew that as quickly as it had beset him, the ability to return to life could be just as quickly snatched away. There was a movement across the room near the hallway and the small kitchen. 

“Hey, he called me Mike,” the dark-haired detective said to Jo in awe. “He never called me that.” 

“It means he’s let you in,” Jo explained, smiling in spite of her apprehension. “Only those he really trusts get a first name nod out of him.” 

“Yeah?” Mike asked, a grin twitching to appear. 

A woman’s blood-curdling scream was heard coming from inside the room followed by rapid gunfire. The two detectives burst into the apartment with their guns drawn. “NYPD!” they both yelled. Inside, they found Ruth sobbing as she lowered her gun. Mike aimed his gun at her, cautiously approaching her, and commanding her to “Drop it!” Ruth dropped the gun and he kicked it away from them. He then handcuffed her and yanked her back over into the living room, muttering that she was some kinda crazy broad. Only then did he see Jo kneeling in front of Henry’s bullet-riddled body slumped in the far corner on the other side of the fireplace. The sight of him with the blood oozing out of him and splattered on the wall behind him made his breath catch in his throat. He could only imagine what Jo was going through as he watched her dial a number on her cell phone while Henry appeared to be taking his last few breaths. 

She hadn’t prepared herself to see this. Who could ever prepare themselves to see the man she loved --- loved? Yes, Loved! --- bloodied and dying right in front of her. It was really more than she could take. She worked to steady her voice as she speed-dialed Abe’s cell phone and advised him to get to the river quickly. 

“What the hell ya callin’ his roommate for?” Mike demanded, totally confused. He nervously fished his cell phone out of his coat pocket to call for a bus but Jo was up in a flash, snatching it out of his hand. “What’s wrong with you? Ya gone batty like her?” he blared at Jo. Had she and Henry both gone batty like the woman he had a hold of? And now, Henry was paying the price, dying right in front of them. Jo said nothing and kneeled back down beside Henry, unmindful of the blood that had seeped into her pants. 

“Henry needs help! This crazy B just shot him full o’ holes!” he franticly pointed out. 

Ruth, seeing Henry more clearly for the first time, halted the flow of her crocodile tears. For the first time, she realized that she had not shot Thad but a man that she had only thought was him. Since she hadn’t expected anyone but Thad to let themselves in with a key, she had been temporarily fooled by the similarity in their builds and hair. Therefore, she had reacted first and gone into fake sobbing mode yelling loud enough for the neighbors to hear that she fired the gun in self-defense. But before any of them could say or do anything else, Henry’s body along with all of the blood and the bullets in his body, vanished in a brilliant flash of white light. 

Mike was floored and left speechless. Ruth collapsed in a faint. A real faint. Jo stood up and wiped tears from her cheeks. She helped Mike get the unconscious woman over to the sofa and laid her down. She straightened up and called for a bus. Ruth was going to need to be looked at by paramedics. And maybe a little oxygen for Mike, who hadn’t appeared to take in a breath in the last five minutes. 

vvvv 

A few miles away, Henry broke through the surface of the East River, gulping in much-needed air. After getting his bearings, he began his butterfly stroke toward shore. As he drew closer, his feet met the gravel-bottomed edge of the river and he began his naked walk of humiliation out of the water, careful to cover his private parts with both hands. Panic and dread washed over him, however, when he failed to see Abe’s car or Abe anywhere. He was confused. Hadn’t he heard Jo call Abe and alert him to get to the river before he’d succumbed to his wounds? A car honk drew his attention to an unfamiliar car parked in the spot where Abe usually parked when picking him up. The car was unfamiliar to him but the driver, an embarrassed black woman, was very familiar to him: Lt. Reece. 

She averted her eyes as he approached on the passenger side and she unlocked the doors, motioning for him to get into the back seat. He opened the door and quickly got in. Thankful that the lieutenant kept her eyes averted from his natural state, he counted himself lucky to see a large bath towel, an NYPD sweatsuit, and running shoes on the back seat next to him. He sheepishly thanked her while drying himself off and got dressed as quickly as he could in order to ease the anxiety and awkwardness they both felt. While she drove him to the antique shop so he could shower and change into more appropriate attire, she filled him in on what had transpired while he was “away”. 

“Well, I’m happy that she’s in custody and young Boseman is safe,” he began, “but how is it that you showed up here to pick me up and not my son?” 

His son. That was another strangeness attached to Henry and his roommate that she would have to get used to, she told herself. “He, uh, called me and asked me to scoop you up since my office is closer to the spot where you usually … return,” she explained. “But, Doctor, you and your … son have to understand that _this _woman is the _wrong _woman for this kind of ride-along. I mean, in case of an emergency, yes, but,” she paused, taking in a deep breath and releasing it. “In the future, either him or Jo. Am I clear?” 

“Clear as day, Lieutenant,” he replied. 

“And, Doctor,” she began with a raised eyebrow and a smile, “welcome back.” 


	24. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 24

**Author's Notes**: I wanted to give a little more detail to Ruth Carlton so I googled how to describe a beautiful woman. Several results came up, naturally, and I settled on one that I thought might fit best into this story. Even though I changed some of the wording, added some of my own, left some original wording out, I failed to capture the site or the userid of the original author. Sorry. If I manage to find it again, I'll update these notes with that info. //Found it! User Mali W asked and ikdj jnwd replied (a decade ago!). <https://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=Awr4zV.PRche6VYA0NFXNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTByc3RzMXFjBGNvbG8DZ3ExBHBvcwM0BHZ0aWQDBHNlYwNzcg--?qid=20080927121713AABCZaG>

And I really did not intend for this fic to have so many chapters (although some of them are pretty short). And I fully intended for this one to be the last. But I think I got just one more to go and that'll be the end. Thank you all for your comments, reviews, suggestions, and interest. Stay safe and be healthy

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There was just something unreal and eerie about Ruth Carlton. She may have faked being mentally unbalanced but her sallow complexion and piercingly-sharp gray eyes did less to convince anyone otherwise. Her eyebrows arched over the curve before dispersing onto the bridge of her dainty nose. The lips, thin, had the strangest curl to them, making an observer believe that a high-pitched witch’s cackle would soon be released. The young woman’s face, framed by pin-straight ebony locks falling to her hips, would almost place her in the beautiful category if it were not for her leanings toward murder and deceit. Overall, she was truly an unearthly beauty --- one of the deadliest kind. 

“What will become of her?” Thad asked as he watched Ruth, strapped to a gurney and flanked by armed unis, being placed into an ambulance. 

“She’ll be reevaluated by a real psychotherapist,” Jo told him. ‘Would you like us to drive you over to the hospital to be with her?” 

Thad turned a painful smile to her. “No, thanks. I may be still in love with her but I’m not stupid. She and I have nothing --- had nothing,” he dejectedly revised his statement. “Do you guys need me for anything else?” he asked them, frowning. 

“No, not right now,” Hanson replied. He handed him a card with his contact information on it. “We’ll be in touch.” 

Thad took the card and pocketed it. He turned to walk away then abruptly turned back around and asked, “Say, where’s the other guy that was with you, the guy with the accent?” He glanced up at the building then back at them. “When I heard those gun shots, it worried me. He’s okay, though, right?” 

“Yeah, yeah, he’s okay,” Jo replied. She swallowed and forced a smile. “Thanks for asking.” Thad nodded and walked to the curb and hailed a cab. She felt Mike’s eyes on her and she slowly turned to him with her lips pressed together, her eyes hitting no higher than the knot in his tie. 

“Okay, Jo,” Mike began, his voice lowered. “Where’s Henry? What the hell ** happened ** up there? And stop sayin’ he’s fine. He took five bullets before he … he just … vanished!” 

“Let’s … talk over here,” she told him. They walked over to their assigned vehicle and got into it. 

vvvv 

Abe leaned against the door jamb with his hands in his pockets while his father finished grooming his hair in front of the bathroom mirror. “Was she mad?” he asked when informed that Lt. Reece should not be called for a pick up from the river unless it was an absolute emergency. 

“No, just greatly embarrassed to see one of her male colleagues … in the buff,” Henry replied. “She said it was a task best left for either you or Jo to perform.” 

“Why didn’t I think of that?” Abe teasingly responded. He swallowed his grin at his father’s reproachful look. He stepped back to allow his father to exit the bathroom and enter his bedroom. Abe resumed his stance against the bedroom door jamb, his hands still in his pockets. 

“So, Jo’s partner now knows about your condition, too,” he said, nodding his approval. “That completes the circle.” He smiled at his father as he armed into his suit coat. 

Henry turned to face his son and sighed. “What’s done is done. I’m sure he has a ton of questions for me, though.” He walked up to Abe and said, “Even so, I feel … good about it.” 

“Heyyy, that’s the spirit, Dad!” Abe declared with a wide grin. “You got a good group of people you can trust to always be there for you,” he added. After I’m gone is what he dared not utter for fear of deflating his father’s bubble of confidence. He followed him down the stairs and when they reached the shop’s entrance door, he noticed something. 

“You forgot your scarf. I’ll go back up and get one for you.” 

“No, that won’t be necessary, Abraham,” Henry told him. “Jo is holding it for me along with my watch.” 

Abe’s grin returned even wider. “Her and that watch of yours,” he sing-songed while wagging a finger at his father. “She’s one special lady.” He tamed his grin into solemnity. “You and she really need to talk, Dad.” 

Henry lowered his head to hide his blush and drew in a deep breath and released it. “You’re quite right, my boy. Of course, it would help greatly if we could manage not to be interrupted when we do sit down and talk.” 

Reminded of the night he’d interrupted them after she’d dumped Isaac Monroe and come to the shop to tell Henry that she’d rather get lost in Paris with him instead, Abe became suddenly animated. “Look, how was I to know that you guys were just about to let loose on each other? I’d just found out some bombshell new information about Mom after 30 years!” 

“Abraham!” Henry got his son’s attention and placed his hands on his shoulders. “It’s all right. Don’t worry about that anymore.” He squeezed his shoulders and left the shop to hail a taxi. 

Still a bit perturbed, Abe closed the door muttering to himself. “Not just me. Dead people. Phone calls,” he added with an upward swipe of his hand. “Not just me.” 

vvvv 

As a result of what had happened in Thad’s and Ruth’s apartment, Werner was taken into custody and brought downtown for questioning. But because they were legally married, they knew that Ruth would not be compelled to testify against him. Instead, she maintained that she had acted out of fear and in self-defense against Thad, claiming that he had both mentally and verbally abused her while mismanaging the restaurant’s funds and blaming it on her. 

“I simply reacted out of fear,” she maintained, stone-faced. “It’s not my fault that you all believed him and sent a decoy in to fool me.” She shot a glare at Mike. “If that man’s dead, whoever he is --- that’s on you guys.” 

“You don’t deny that you and Werner jumped the broom five years ago,” he stated. 

Her gaze danced away from his. “Doesn’t mean a thing. People break up all the time and don’t get divorced. I found Thad and he just proved not to be the right guy for me.” Her gaze snatched back to his. “And Pat’s a competent professional. We haven’t done anything wrong,” she asserted. 

On the other side of the glass, along with Henry and Reece, Thad stood and watched with a heavy heart. “Can’t believe what a fool I’ve been,” he quietly berated himself. “She’s lying on me and protecting that, that creep!” 

“So, you and … Pat … never schemed to off Thad Boseman and cash in on the million-dollar insurance policy on him?” Mike asked. 

“It was on the business,” she emphasized. 

“Yeah, but if he was to die, the surviving business owner --- you --- could cash in that policy and live large.” 

“So? It was his restaurant when I met him. I just helped him to expand it,” she countered. 

“Well, ya know,” Mike drew out as he stood up and raised the blinds on the adjacent wall to reveal Werner seated at a table in the next room and writing on a legal-sized notepad. “I think hubby might be singin’ a different tune.” 

Ruth stiffened as she watched just as her husband finished writing and pushed the pad over to Jo. She quickly read over it and then, nodding, held it up so Mike and Ruth could see. Ruth stared at her husband, who stared back at her and then lowered his head, averting his eyes away from hers. 

Mike smirked as he closed the blinds again and sauntered back over to stand by his chair. He shook his head when Ruth asked to be cut a deal. “Too late,” he said and motioned for the uni standing near the door to take her away. 

“There’s something you don’t know about him,” Ruth blurted out, referring to her husband. Mike raised a halting hand to the uni and nodded for her to continue. “It was all his idea. I saved all of our text messages. All of our emails. They’re in the cloud,” she said, her pained words laced with anger. 

Mike looked over at the mirror to the spot where his colleagues and Thad would be standing on the other side. He looked back at Ruth. “We’ll check all that out,” he said. “But I’ll put in a word to the DA about goin’ easier on ya if you give us the truth about Thad.” 

She appeared caught off guard at that. Swallowing, she sat back in her chair and lowered her eyes to her hands. “Thad … never harmed me and he wasn’t responsible for the restaurant’s failing. In fact, he did everything he could to try to make both the business and our relationship work. To tell you the truth, if I hadn’t been married to Pat … if I hadn’t already sunk myself into this dirty scheme …. Thad and I probably could have had a real shot at a real relationship.” She swallowed again and smiled and chuckled unexpectedly. “Dizzy Ruthie, true to form, blew it again,” she stated, referring to herself. 

Reece and Henry looked at Thad. Hers from sympathy, Henry’s more from empathy. At the end of Nora’s life, imprisoned in her old age for having accidentally shot and killed Anna Peyton while trying to kill him and expose his secret to the world, she had also displayed remorse and much regret for her earlier mistreatment of him by having had him committed to an asylum. So many wasted years apart, she’d told him. If only she had believed him, she’d said with much regret. Yes, if only, Henry told himself. Things would have been much different between them. But since she hadn’t believed him and after all the years, decades spent apart from each other, he had long since abandoned thinking of them as husband and wife. 

Thad huffed out a sigh and washed his hand down over his face. “Time for me to go,” he quietly told them. But Henry could tell that the young man had made his own decision about Ruth and him. One that now excluded her from his life. “Will I be called to testify at any trial?” he asked before leaving the room. 

“Most likely not,” Reece told him. “They’re facing attempted murder, conspiracy, embezzlement, attempted insurance fraud, among other things. I expect them both to plead guilty. If they do, they’ll just be sentenced. No trial.” 

Thad nodded somberly. “Guess I’ll shut down the restaurant --- sell it if I can --- and try to start over again somewhere else. Just not in New York,” he said. 

Henry had read over the umbrella policy and was reminded of something. “Excuse me, Thad. But are you aware that the policy also pays off if one of the owners is rendered incapacitated or no longer able to perform their duties? That includes any attempt to willfully victimize or extort the other owner for financial gain.” Seeing that he had Thad’s full attention, he continued. “In which case, the victimized owner could claim half the policy’s worth, $500,000. That should be more than enough to settle your company’s accounts.” 

“Gosh, I … never really read it all the way through,” he said, finally showing a more relaxed smile. “Thanks for telling me, Doctor. That’ll help a lot.” They shook hands, he nodded his goodbye to Reece, and he left. 

“So, do you have a law degree, too?” Reece asked Henry as they left the small viewing room. 

He chuckled. “No, no. I merely read it out of curiosity. When I read that particular clause, I knew.” 

“Knew what?” she asked. 

“That Werner had plans to take their scheme a step further once Thad was out of the way. It’s not in the policy but the fact that he would be Ruth’s surviving spouse --- “ 

Reece couldn’t believe her ears. But it was coming from their ultra-observant ME so it clearly made sense. “He had plans to ditch her once Thad was dead and she had cashed in on the policy.” 

“Yes,” he replied. “I don’t believe he actually had planned to kill her in order to obtain control of the insurance money. You see, New York is an equitable distribution state in the case of divorce. All he had to do, as her therapist, was to declare her insane and keep her locked away in some institution. He most likely never planned to divorce her, therefore, making claim to the entire windfall instead of just half.” 

“While he lived the high life spending the money.” Reece closed her eyes and shook her head. “I’m like Mike now: what is wrong with people?” 

Just at that moment, they both became aware of Jo and Mike behind them. Henry slowly turned around to face them and Reece parted from them with a smile and “good job”. Even though a million questions were running through his mind, Mike could tell by the looks in their eyes that his two partners needed some privacy. He patted Henry on the arm and began to walk away, stopping to look over his shoulder when Henry called his name. 

“We should talk,” Henry told him. “I know you have some questions, so … please come by the shop later on after work. Okay?” 

“Sure thing,” Mike replied. He smiled and continued his trek toward the bullpen. 

Henry turned his attention back to Jo. She bit her lower lip and lowered her eyes. They both jostled up against the wall to get out of the way of two unis each passing by in both directions. They decided to duck into a nearby breakroom where they found themselves alone. They leaned against the counter near the sink as they gazed longingly into each other’s eyes. There was time now, just a bit; and enough privacy for them to gaze a little deeper, a little longer. Jo reached down into her jacket pocket and produced his gold pocket watch. She held it out to him. 

“You left this,” she said, blinking back tears. 

He smiled and took it from her. “Thank you.” He clipped it back into place on his person. 

“And this,” she said, holding out his thin scarf neatly rolled up. “Not used to seeing you without one of these,” she said, laughing softly. He reached for it but she shook her head. “No. Let me.” She unrolled it, stepped closer to him, and lifted it over his head. He bowed a bit in order to make it easier for her to place it around his neck and felt as honored as someone being knighted by the queen.

She seemed to make a big fuss about making it “look right” and then suddenly stopped, grabbing onto both sides hanging down. He could tell by her tight-fisted but trembling grip that the whole ordeal had taken a toll on her and he was sorry for that. So sorry. He placed his hands over hers to calm their trembling. She looked up into his eyes, her cheek muscles and lips twitching in an effort to keep her tears from falling. 

“Jo, darling --- “ 

“He could have worn armor,” she said about Thad in a shaky tone and pulled harder on the scarf. 

“We would have had to wait for that,” he told her. “The time was right for us to catch them in that moment in the middle of their shady plan.” 

“Mike could have gone in,” she said, offering an alternative scenario. 

“He’s a devoted husband and the father of two young boys,” he countered. “We would never have forgiven ourselves --- I would never have forgiven myself --- for not standing in and taking that gunfire. Who else among us could have survived it?” 

She started to shake her head. “I don’t --- .“ She released the scarf and clamped her hand over her mouth, the first few tears rolling down her cheeks. “It was so gruesome to see you that way, Henry. You were … you were … “ Dead is what she couldn’t say and he didn’t want her to say it. 

“But I returned. Just as I told you that I always do,” he gently assured her. “That’s the way it is with me; living with me.” He rubbed his hand soothingly up and down her back, only then realizing that his arms had encircled her waist. She closed her eyes and her arms encircled his neck. They closed their eyes and held each other. No daylight between them. He kissed her on her cheek as she softly cried, then on the side of her forehead and hugged her closer, his cheek pressing against hers. He surprised himself at his next words. 

“I love you, Jo.” He tensed when she abruptly pulled away and looked him directly in the eyes. Had he said the wrong thing? Something she had not cared to hear? Had he put too much faith in what he thought might be a blooming relationship with her? 

She squeezed her eyes shut and a wide grin spread across her face. She opened her eyes and did her best to calm herself so she could speak. “I love you, too, Henry,” she managed to choke out between sobs. Happy sobs, though. 

He closed his eyes and opened them, relieved and happy beyond words. His thumb caressed along her jawline and she tilted her head up in anticipation of her lips meeting his. Just as their lips met, a jubilant voice rang out amidst whistles and clapping. “There you go, there you go!” one jubilant voice was heard to rise above the clamor. 

Interruptions, always interruptions! As they released their embrace, Jo grabbed him by the hand and shoved her way past the small but happy throng, pulling Henry with her. He ruefully began to wonder if interruptions were also part of his curse. 


	25. A Ride-Along with Reece Ch 25

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some Jenry moments but not what you think (get your minds out of the gutter LOL). Henry tells his long story to Mike.

Jo pulled Henry by the hand past the small but happy throng, intentionally jabbing the uni crowing “There you go, there you go!” in the ribs, only briefly satisfied at his painful response. She then hooked her arm around Henry’s elbow and guided him over to the elevator. Once there, she banged the side of her fist on the down button and waited impatiently for the car to arrive. When it did and the doors opened, she roughly guided Henry inside and pushed the L button for the lobby. 

“Those idiots!” she rasped through clenched teeth. “Their minds full of lust!” 

“Although I quite agree, Detective,” Henry started, “I still must ask where --- “ He abruptly stopped, swallowing his words as Jo nearly shoved him out of the elevator once it reached the lobby and the doors opened. “Where are we going?” he asked as she released his arm and he followed her out of the building. 

“Just get in the car, Henry,” she firmly told him. 

They got in and buckled up. While she drove like a woman on a mission, Henry could see that she was greatly annoyed and maybe a bit embarrassed at their attempt at a kiss having been witnessed by a handful of lascivious unis. 

“Bet those knuckleheads are collecting their winnings from that stupid pool,” Jo rasped again, her teeth still clenched. “Makes me so mad!” 

“Well, at least I don’t believe that they heard any of our discussion,” Henry said in an attempt to allay any fears she might be having about that. The car slowed and Jo parked. Frowning, he looked up at the building they were parked in front of and asked, “Is this a new crime scene?” he asked. 

Without a word, Jo got out of the car and he did likewise. Still frowning and confused, he followed her up the stairs and watched her put in an entry code. 

“Whose place --- ?” He abruptly swallowed the rest of his words again when she opened the door and snatched him inside. Once inside, he allowed himself a smile as she dragged him into the living room of this unknown dwelling. 

She quickly turned to him and threw her arms around his neck, finally relaxing against him. “This is my sister’s, Maria’s, house,” she breathily explained. “She and her husband, Tony, took their kids to Disney World. We shouldn’t be interrupted here.” 

“What a delightful change of pace that would be,” he said, grinning, his voice deep and low. Their eyelids fluttered close and they both tightened their embrace as their lips fully met and the long, overdue kiss deepened. 

vvvv 

Abe’s Antiques, later that same evening … 

A confounded but grateful Mike Hanson sat across from Henry at the small table in their small kitchen. Confounded because he’d never in his life heard anything like what Henry had just related to him. Grateful because he now realized just how hard it must have been to open up to him or anyone else, for that matter. After his sixth or seventh “Wow”, the big man shook his head full of thick, dark hair and blinked his green eyes at this immortal man in front of him. A living, real live immortal man! His eyes traveled from Henry and over to a smiling Abe, who raised his eyebrows a bit as their eyes met. Another “Wow” left Mike and he chuckled nervously, washing his hand over his mouth. 

“Dad didn’t mention that you were the strong, silent type,” Abe joked, trying to lighten the mood after his father’s mostly depressing tale. “That all you have to say is Wow?” 

“Da-ad,” Mike said, breaking up the word with another nervous chuckle. “The two of you.” He raised his eyebrows and grinned, shaking his head. “Wow.” Realizing that the two men --- and Jo, for that matter --- were anxiously awaiting more of a response from him, he cleared his throat and squared his shoulders. And then deflated. “I mean … geez, I just don’t know what to say.” 

Henry, Jo, and Abe all shared a look and released a collective sigh as they leaned back in their chairs. 

“Okay, okay, uh … “ He looked at Henry and said, “Thanks, Doc --- for letting me in.” He raised a finger and smiled, adding, “But I knew from the first time we met that there was something … “ He stopped himself from saying ‘weird’. “Uh, different about you. I mean a gravedigger and a medical doctor? No way.” 

His three dinner companions laughed softly and he continued. “But it all falls into place now. The reason ya have so much knowledge packed into ya about things nobody else knows or even thinks about anymore. That Jack the Ripper stuff and Black Dahlia murder stuff. And that pancakey-syrupy smell on that guy’s cap that turned out to be from his perspiration because of untreated diabetes. Stuff like that.” 

Henry smiled and nodded, remembering the Aaron Brown murder case involving the records of Jo’s deceased husband, Sean Moore. He caught her eye to see how it affected her to be reminded and was gratified to see her return a strong, un-sad smile. 

“Then, there was the Hans Koehler case,” he said, rubbing his chin between his thumb and fingers. “You went up on the roof of Grand Central with Jo but never came back down.” He frowned at the memory and continued. “I was so intent upon getting help for Jo after finding her unconscious and shot, that it didn’t occur to me that one of those gunshots I’d heard had connected with you. You … died up there and, and vanished, didn’t you? Jo just didn’t remember it or see it because she had lost consciousness,” he speculated. 

Henry hesitated before replying, tensing slightly. “Actually, I … ah … was shot soon after Jo was but … “ He relaxed significantly when he felt Jo’s hand on his forearm. He placed his other hand atop hers and squeezed a thanks to her. “I’d fallen down but managed to get back up to my feet just as he was about to release the poison gas into the ventilation system. I grabbed him and … we both fell off the roof to our deaths. Then my body vanished.” 

Mike stared at Henry in horror at that revelation. “That would … explain things,” he whispered. His features calmed and he said, “Sorry ya felt ya had to keep stuff like that to yourself for so long. Guess that’s the way things have always worked for you, huh?” 

“Let’s just say that the times when my trust has not been betrayed have been few and far between,” Henry replied. “But I am very grateful for those few times. It’s always good to have friends one can trust,” he added. 

Mike smiled slightly and nodded. Then his brow knitted and he looked at Jo, then back at Henry. “Wait a minute,” he began, “besides Lieu and these two, does Lucas know?” 

“Yes,” Henry hesitantly replied, smiling. “But he’s my assistant and works closely with me,” he quickly added. “And because of something he’d done for me once, I felt that I owed the lad an explanation.” 

“He beat me,” Mike stated grumpily. The others chuckled. Mike’s eyes narrowed at Henry. “Lad. Guess I’d be a lad, too,” he ventured. “I mean based on your more early birth date.” 

“Me, too,” Abe chimed in with a broad smile. “Although to the eyes of the world, I might not look like it.” 

Mike looked at Abe and said, “Henry raised you.” Abe nodded, still smiling. “And you came out okay,” he said thoughtfully. He looked at Henry again and said, “Ya gotta help me out with some child-rearing tips. Seriously. My old man kinda half-assed with me and my younger brother. Maybe that’s why my two boys are monsters! Seriously!” he repeated, raising his voice above their laughter and claims that he was exaggerating. His cell phone rang and he lifted a hand while he retrieved it from his jacket pocket and answered it. 

“Errr, my wife, Karen,” he told them, keeping his eyes trained on the phone's screen. “Texting me to see when I’ll be home.” He tapped his reply and pocketed the phone and looked back up at them. “Time for me to go. But before I do … you said that you have no idea how or why you got this immortality.” 

“Quite correct,” he replied. “I only know when. And I have no idea how to stop it. There’s nothing more I’d like than to have a normal life. One that would allow me to age and meet a final end like everyone else.” 

“All this time, you’ve never met anyone else like you?” Mike asked. He watched Henry’s smile fade and he lowered his head a bit, his eyes darting quickly over to Jo and Abe then down at his hands. Sensing he’d hit a nerve, indicating that Henry had met someone else like himself, he also sensed that there was a troubling aspect to the situation. “Story for another time, eh, Doc?” he said, temporarily letting him off the hook with one of Henry’s own lines. 

“Quite,” was all Henry said, relaxing once again and smiling. 

Mike thanked them for the hearty meal of spicy, Thai Jungle Soup and tried unsuccessfully to get the recipe from Abe for his wife. He bid goodbye to Jo and Abe and Henry walked him to the door and the two men shook hands. 

“I’m serious about those parenting tips, Doc,” he told him before leaving. “No joke.” Henry laughed and promised he’d offer what he could. “Oh, and, uh, take good care of Jo,” he said with a wink after he stepped outside the shop. “Yeah. I know about you two.” 

Henry exuberantly bounded back up the stairs, taking them two at a time, and returned to the kitchen where he found his son and his lovely lady halfway through the kitchen cleanup. 

“Oh, good, Pops, you’re back,” Abe said, drying his hands on the kitchen towel. “I’ll leave the rest of this to you and Jo.” He and his father hugged and he retired to his bedroom. 

They both smiled as they found themselves once again alone. 

“Can I get one of those, too?” Jo asked him. 

“Thought you’d never ask,” he replied, grinning. 

“Finish the kitchen first!” Abe’s voice reached them from his bedroom. 

Jo’s eyes popped open wider and her jaw dropped as she fought to contain her laughter. 

“Sometimes he treats me as though he were the parent,” Henry leaned down and explained to her in a whisper. 

“I heard that!” Abe’s voice loudly emanated from the hallway and into the kitchen again. 

They laughed and Henry kissed her soundly on the side of her neck before they resumed the kitchen cleanup. As he watched Jo wash the rest of the dishes and he dried and put them away, he listened to her express her happiness at how well things had worked out for him. Yes, he thought to himself, things had worked out rather well. Things were good. Life was good. And with a wonderful son like Abe, friends he could trust, and this lovely woman by his side --- his life could only get better. 

FINIS 

That's it! Finally reached the end of this fic. Oh, and Lt. Reece doing a ride-along next year? Let's just say that she conveniently sprained her ankle, poor thing. Oh, darn! LOL And although Karen Hanson did not meet Henry in this fic, it doesn't mean that she won't meet him in another of my fics. Or maybe I'll tack on a short epilogue to this one. We'll see where my warped brain and typing fingers lead me. Thank you all for your comments, reviews, kudos, and interest.


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